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**The Economist**




Comrades,

Today is my e-birthday, and I feel like having a bit of a self-serving article for once. So there will be no news, no analysis, just me rambling for a while. If me rambling is (understandably) something you don’t care about then I won’t mind if you don’t bother reading, just please don’t think I’ve turned the Economist into a vanity paper and unsubscribe- it’s a one off.

So- one year ago I joined the game. What made me join? Well to be honest I was playing another browser game at the time, and was quite high up in it under a different name. A friend of mine knew about this and was raving on about this game called eRepublik, and a party called the Iran Green Party and how they weren’t green at all. I forgot all about it, but a month later in December I was growing bored of my existing game and decided to give it a go.

I followed in the footsteps of countless noobs by fighting in the last battle of the French Toast war (Flanders) and losing most of my wellness for a paltry 9 damage. At that time there were no wars in the UK, so I slowly built my wellness up manually. After a brief holiday IRL (9 days) in early January I got stuck in, started using the forums, and ran for congress for the first time. Due to the lack of battles I had about 70 wellness, and due to the lack of Exp associated with war only just hit level 12 in time to candidate myself.




Congressional Period

At the time I first ran the party president of TUP was Squiddy. To me, he was a mysterious and powerful figure who came top of the congressional polls. It is easy to think of people like Squiddy and Malta now as equals, but at the time (as a new player who didn’t use IRC) they were older members of the community to be respected. Squiddy allowed me to stand in my home region of Yorkshire, where I managed to overturn the MDU domination of the region and become an MP.

My “Congressional Period” of my career (where congress was the most important part of my game) stretched from January 25th to March 15th. In that time there were a number of major issues cropping up in game, not the least of which was ongoing tension between the newly liberated Germany and Sweden. It looked likely that Sweden would invade the smaller country again, and we decided to make an effort to mitigate the situation. Final Destiny, Squiddy and myself each tackled one of the (nominally allied) countries ourselves. I was given Poland. It wasn’t easy, especially with a number of high-profile UKers including Deathtoll and Shadow saying we should simply back Sweden to the hilt and ignore Germany, but we managed to put off any invasion. That wouldn’t come until May.

In early March Malta_1990, then Party President, was taken ill with pneumonia and stopped coming online. As a result he was unable to run again as Party President. At the time I was infamous within the party as an ‘authoritarian’, advocating a party whip for parliament, constitutional limits on power and other such innovations which upset several party old guard, most notably HazzN. Squiddy was trying to mitigate the situation by trying to find a compromise, but I took a stand and pushed it to a vote. Around a week before the PP elections I declared my intent to stand, and many party members who were less in favour of my positions left the party to form a new party, the Liberal Social Democrats, around a core of RoadRunnerSpeed, Hassan Pesaran and HazzN, all former TUP members of high stature.




Party President Period

As they predicted I won the election. I was the first UKer to use Mass Messaging extensively in both Party President and Congressional campaigning, and it showed. With a large mandate I set about making TUP the most unpopular party in the forums. The first controversy came when TUP released a national manifesto, raising screams of “It should be about candidates not parties!” despite many of those who made objections having virtually identical manifestos. The national manifesto was quickly developed in a new section of our forums- party conference. At the same time the party manifesto was being written, we voted on a new constitution which defined the party as a democratic socialist party. The manifesto and constitution were released simultaneously, and after the furore died down we had a successful election returning a good number of candidates, all forum active (rare at the time).

The second controversy came around a week later. UKRP had taken a step back after Jerry’s second term and didn’t stand a Presidential candidate. Seeing our chance, TUP backed Malta_1990, our most experienced member, for President. At the time the support for Malta was quite far-reaching. Although we stood alone many individual members of the forums pledged support. We ran the first mass-messaging campaign in a UK presidential election and messaged roughly 90% of the population with over 35 experience points. Malta won in a landslide. However many forum members complained that our messages were biased in favour of TUP! I know it sounds crazy now but at the time people genuinely expected parties to message people saying “these are all the parties you can join, they’re equally good” or “these are the candidates, all are good!” Obviously our messages asked people to vote TUP, after all why let others benefit from our hard work? Anyway since then there have been several more controversies where forum members have complained that we’ve been messaging our stance to people and that we’re too biased.

Guess what? I am biased!

During the campaign I had developed an idea to increase national wellness. At the time we had no wars at all that we could fight in (war games weren’t invented and we were far from any front), so we had a national health service that gifted people (even people on 80 wellness!). This was obviously inefficient, so we introduced “Wellness Fast”, the predecessor of “Wellness through War”. We paid for two moving tickets and shipped our sickly citizens to warzones to jump 40 wellness a fight. It worked really well at the time, when war-games were impossible, and despite what critics say the general population loved it. Anyway I wrote the legislation up, and due to me being about as popular as Satan himself someone else introduced it. At this point we hit more controversy. TUP obviously promised to back this in the manifesto, so out came the whip and MPs were asked to vote in favour. Other parties opposed it here and there (nothing unified) and so we needed a solid block vote. We got it- all 12 TUP MPs voted as a block and we won easily due to the forum inactivity of other parties congress members.

I should probably say something about my term as Minister of Finance here. Firstly, I was parachuted into the position (no previous ministry experience) because RoadRunnerSpeed was stepping down and I was quite frankly trustworthy. I have never claimed that I was a brilliant MoF, I did the simple job of handing out money and maintaining the monetary market. I didn’t do much trading of currencies or any of the fancy things the MoF gets up to now. I am very much a generalist and happily resigned in favour of Arthur as soon as I thought he was ready (which was a mere one month- an indication of his talent in monetary matters despite our disagreements). I would also like to say that despite a four or five month antagonistic period Arthur and I were friends at the time and there was no hard feelings.

My final act as Party President was to nominate Sara Droz as President of the UK effectively dooming Hassan (who had PCP and LSD support) to lose. Rather than lose badly he opted to quit (a decision he would probably later regret as calls for impeachment rose). At the time I was friends with Sara Droz (I still am on a personal level though we fight on different sides) and Hassan was associated with TUP haters in the LSD. So after a vote which was very much in favour of Sara TUP won their second election of the new era.

When I won the Party President elections our membership was at 237, our paper had around 30 subs, we saw winning CP as impossible and we were the third party. When I left it had nearly four hundred members, had shot into second place, had around 120 subs for our newspaper (8th nationally) and we had brought two successive Presidents to power.




Private projects

At this time I quit my posts as Minister, PP and eventually congressman for Yorkshire and Humberside. I wanted to try my hand at some private projects. At the time this paper, the Economist, was one of them. I started my ongoing battle with MoD news for the top spot in the UK (in subs) and didn’t give up until September when things (militarily) picked up. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

At the time I was a strong supporter of ATLANTIS. Romania and the USA were good friends to the UK, and thanks to close relationships between our respective heads of state we were in a good position within the alliance. However there were problems. We didn’t have any war. Our economy was in an appalling state, and only super-taxes imposed by RoadRunnerSpeed were keeping our armed forces mobile. Wellness fast collapsed after Malta left office. Our armed forces had only one company (which I bought from Lotfire at cost for the Paras). The navy had about 60 or so members and the Royal Guard was a hugely inactive force.

In light of this I decided to try and follow two dreams of mine- to form a small private army and to reform our military. Having never had a position in the armed forces I couldn’t just butt in and try and reform it directly, so I decided to simply build up an army and offer it to the UK government. And thus Camelot was born. At first we were based in Podolia, then Romania. But successive defeats inflicted on ATLANTIS by Indonesia stopped that. In the end I bought two gun companies in the UK and a Q2 iron company in Spain. Our optimum membership was 30, and we had a very simple setup. Guns were distributed every day or two, and usually consisted of 3 guns per soldier, up to 5 in important battles (especially as over time skill rose). All members were recruited directly from the population.

I should mention that none of this could have happened without the support and help of ex-President JerryGFL, who worked in our companies, sold us our iron company and has been a friend throughout my time in erepublik. Thanks Jerry!

Many Navy members complained that I was poaching their members. At the time the Navy never supplied its members with guns or moving tickets, whereas Camelot did both. Midway through Sara Droz’s term friendly MPs introduced the Corps Act into parliament. Although it differed somewhat from my vision of a central army supported by competitive corps I backed it and our MPs followed me. The Royal Navy disbanded by executive order and most of its members formed a corps called the Vagabonds. The org still exists today in Brazil I believe, though at the time it was West Siberian Region. The iron company owned by that org in Russia is (I believe) still Royal Navy property today. The bill eventually failed to pass the House of Lords (which has irritated me since forever by the way) and the Royal Navy got itself together and reformed. However they had learned from their time as a corps and the whole army began to slowly adopt a company based model. At first it was supplementary but later under Kumnaa and then Hassan became standard.

Camelot grew in strength and at one point had a theoretical maximum damage which would put the other, official, branches of the army to shame, especially considering we had no funding and relied entirely on our members. However as the Special Forces and Navy began to copy our methods the organisation became defunct and mostly disbanded, leaving only a few members behind to work until all our iron was used up. I think that I helped keep players in the game, and by proxy achieved my goal of reforming the navy. A number of people in that organisation approached me for help in organising their companies at the time. They’ll remain nameless, since at the time the Navy most certainly didn’t <3 me and it was quite big of them to ask for help. Anyway the navy of today is such a well-oiled and quite frankly incredible organisation it’s hard to equate it with the small navy of the past.




Real UK Government/Cabal

As Sara Droz became less and less popular so too did Atlantis. The Swedish-German war divided the alliance, with the Anglo-sphere choosing not to enter the conflict. Most of the now-EDEN countries in Eastern and Northern Europe fought with Sweden. Camelot fought openly for Germany. During this time I made friends with Germans which I hold to this day, and it is the country I usually live in other than the UK. We even helped redesign their military-in-exile based on the emerging companies model.

It was decided by many on the left that the UKRP couldn’t be allowed re-election, despite the fact the UKRP had bluntly said they would not be re-standing Sara. Before I go on to discuss the Cabal, I should really say I think poor Sara had it hard. Her own party deserted her, and though TUP continued to (mostly) support her she had no leg to stand on. The final blow, RoadRunnerSpeed stealing the entire Bank of England and then parading around with it forcing her to capitulate to his demands or lose 6 months of work, was a heinous crime against the UK state and not her fault at all. She was faced with many unsolvable problems as Country President and I think she was as much a victim of her critics’ personal dislike as she was of circumstance.

Anyway, the tide of anti-Sara sentiment led to many well placed figures, namely Hassan Pesaran, RoadRunnerSpeed, John Forseti (TUP PP at the time), and the parachute regiment deciding to support a single candidate. Key to this plan was getting a raft of support which would preclude any chance of UKRP victory. In the end TUP and PCP both backed Kumnaa, and history was made. His victory (with a whole raft of HAIL KUMNAA propaganda) signalled the death of the UKRP as the first party of the UK. Though it took TUP some months to catch up, from that moment their election power was crippled.

Kumnaa made a number of changes to the UK, most notably increasing military spending, especially on companies. He also brought us our first war on home ground since French Toast (invading Ireland in a pretend invasion) and participated in the US-Ireland wargames. This was the ‘neutral period’. The politics of the time are probably more familiar to players, so I won’t go into too much detail. My position was quite lowly. I maintained my close relationship with the Unity Party but had little access to the government or Kumnaa. Nothing really went wrong and we had a good month.

Hassan joined TUP again after almost a year of being out of the party in June 2008. He said he was in the party because he wanted to be part of us, and assured us he wasn’t here just to get elected. When primaries came around he put himself forward and John Forseti again supported a successful President. This time TUP and PCP won by around eighty votes or so, and Hassan started his two terms. He introduced Kumnaa’s hub, joined PEACE and participated in the war on the USA and Canada, bringing the UK into the new world as an active participant and not just a sleepy nation in Northern Europe. Coincidentally I returned to cabinet as Minister of Trade. I found the Ministry to be limited in its scope and pretty much due for retirement (something I still think today). However at the time Arthur Wellesley was MoF and advocated a very free-market low-tax position and so I stayed in the MoT for another four months to ensure there was a left wing alternative.

The big controversy of Hassan’s term for me was the introduction (by me) of nationalisation plans for (initially) the Q2 food market. The plan would have later spread to involve all sectors of the economy, effectively introducing government regulations to all markets. Although there was no vote, the UK was very divided on the issue. Many congressmen are business owners and there was deep opposition from the right. I argued that the food markets were excessively priced (often Q2 food was over £1.80) and needed regulation. In the end I sold several of my companies and opened three Q2 food companies and a Q2 grain company and drove prices down myself. People argued I was circumventing democracy by intervening without government support whilst at the same time arguing that individuals should be the only business owners. It confused me no end but in the end I just did it anyway. The rest of the plan was achieved indirectly- lower food prices increased spending money and drove people to open businesses in weapons and moving tickets, indirectly giving us the low prices we have today.

In Hassan’s first term I was approached by GLadDOS, one of the many citizens who moved to the UK after our membership of PEACE was announced. GLadDOS was then a member of the PCP, but had decided he wanted to move to TUP due to the radicalisation of the party as new member Johnobrow began to make his presence felt. GLadDOS was quite open about his ambition to run for President, and we welcomed him. I am including his term here purely because he is the last cabal member to become President.

After Hassan’s second term he stood down as probably our most popular President of all time. His approval rating was huge. Into his shoes stepped GLadDOS. TUP had previously had their traditional primary, and Mr Woldy had agreed to step back for a month on the condition that GLadDOS only stood for one term. Mr Woldy at this time was Minister of Home Affairs and was massively popular in the party. Many people wanted him to stand and GLadDOS’ support was by no means universal. However I threw my weight behind him nevertheless.

For me, the term was a disappointment. GLadDOS abandoned many of the left-wing principles he had assured me he had, and instead tended to support Arthur Wellesley’s position more and more often. In the end, I stopped doing my job and basically slandered his government for 2 straight weeks before essentially being fired from my role. I deserved it, and to be honest should have just resigned as soon as I realised the government had stopped being a TUP one. Finally, after realising he wasn’t getting our support again he quit and joined the newly formed Free Democrat Party.

As a quick aside, the Free Democrat Party is synonymous with the cabal in my mind. It has all the same members, and is essentially the same organisation. That is not to say it is evil. It advocates a free-market, low-tax, military based country. It also freely admits to being elitist, and I respect them for sticking to their guns far more than I respect those who flip-flop from one position to another on a monthly basis. With the founding of the FDP the cabal period of contention ended, and the cold war between myself and Arthur expanded to include the FDP and TUP. We were no longer united against a common enemy, we were now opponents.




UK-Left

In Hassan’s second term I started to talk more and more with Johnobrow, the then President of the PCP. In the end I created an IRC chat room, #UK-Left, on rizon for us to talk in. We both invited the PCP and TUP members who use IRC regularly and from there we began to form long-lasting friendship between our two parties that had once been so opposed.

The stated goals of UK-Left was to ensure a left-wing, competent UK President, to promote socialist projects such as the communes and my own food market moderation (which are both still ongoing!). We also had one unspoken goal- to ensure that we never again let people run for the Presidency under our name who weren’t committed to our goals. When Mr Woldy stated his intent to run against GLaDOS both TUP and PCP collectively backed him. He was the first candidate who was a UK-Left candidate rather than TUP (Backed by PCP) or PCP (backed by TUP). Many people have asked why we don’t merge. The truth is that both PCP and TUP have very strong and very unique identities, much as UKRP, BEP and FDP do. We believe different things and to us ideology and belief is very important.

Woldy’s first term was for me one of the best we’ve ever had. Woldy was fairly humble, honest about his shortcomings and strengths, and worked hard. He wasn’t too proud to mess about in the spam halls and wasn’t from an elite background. He was an ordinary guy who won because he made friends with an awful lot of other ordinary guys who voted for him. He didn’t court the powerful, and he defeated GLadDOS to win the Presidency against all popular opinion.




International Period

On the 25th of October I once again left congress and the then Minister of Defence and Foreign Affairs Necrosis got me an invite to the mobile wing of PEACE, the PEACEKeepers. I have a lot of respect for these guys, and they’re still pretty awesome now. I’m going to leave a lot of the things I’ve done internationally off-record, but I will say that in terms of breaking into international politics the likes of Antonio Salgado, Dishmcds (even considering our past opposition) and so on were instrumental. Antonio (then Secretary General of PEACE) let me into the secret rooms and I basically replaced Glorious Failure/Necrosis after his burnout.

Thus I was there when PEACE died, and I was there when PHOENIX was born. It was a massive privilege to be there for both events, and it has been exciting having a small part in the proceedings. When the new positions were proposed (SG, Supreme Commander, Treasurer) I put myself forward as Treasurer on the off chance that I could get a role that would allow me to continue to guide the new alliance. The support was good and I feel so proud of our allies, of Germany, UNL, Serbia, Russia, and all the cool friends we have made. Having been part of three alliances, I can say that all have their own feel. People will say “ATLANTIS was crap” or “PEACE failed”. The truth is that there are really nice people in all three alliances the UK has been in. PHOENIX has the beauty of youth, and it’s members are enthusiastic and generous. In time the timbre of the alliance will deepen as PEACEs did. It sounds sad but when you spend days and weeks working with a small group of people you end up with genuine bonds, and the collapse of PEACE for me was a genuinely emotional time. In the old War-room, made by Pakistanis in beta, there were a few e-tears shed as old friends ended up drifting apart as their countries divided. The PEACEKeepers made a blood-pact of loyalty to the old member-states.




Conclusion

All in all what I’m trying to get across here is a sense of the journey I’ve made without putting in too many details. Also, I would like to impress that there is more to this game than ruthless self-promotion. A lot of players aggressively push their own interests and quickly burn out or end up getting bored. It can be as fun to set more modest goals, or seek to specialise in one particular area.

One year after I started playing this game I find myself in the unique position of having experienced every aspect of the game without ever having been a media mogul, super rich, president or military leader. Friends have become enemies and then friends again.

I have always enjoyed the game, the contention, the debate, the hatred haha...

To sum it all up, the secret to success in eRepublik is to always put others first.

Thank you to everyone who has been part of my e-life in the last year. But special thanks go to members of The Unity Party, especially our hard working MPs and PPs. And also to the following people:

Deathtoll32
Bob Boblo
Rastari
HazzN
RoadRunnerSpeed
Dishmcds
LordJustice
Arthur Wellesley
GLadDOS (of course!)

For being my opponents, for being my reason for still playing. I love an honourable enemy 😃


Iain Keers
Old Man


Ps. Indiekid, Count Drakula, Robalbinio & co have been there since the start and Yorkshire will always be my home!