Countries are Rangers Now

Day 1,116, 23:43 • Published in Israel USA • by Rheinlander von Phalz


11 December 2010, Day 1,117 of the New World. The new Natural Enemy mechanic is in place, and country presidents have already used it to open free wars with neighbors. One good example of this is the current war against Pakistan by China.



As a Congress member, I got a little advance notice about this upcoming mechanic. The message explained practically nothing, but this thread did. One particular section of interest is quoted below:

“What bonuses apply against the Natural Enemy?
All the citizens with the citizenship of your country will get a +10% War influence bonus in the battles against your Natural Enemy. This bonus will be applied only in the War Influence, not also in Rank Gain.”

If Natural Enemy proposals were not restricted to neighboring countries, this would influence bonus would be more useful. For example, many smaller countries would not want to open a free war with a neighboring country who could crush them, but they might benefit from a +10% influence bonus against a certain country they encounter often in battles via MPP’s. Serbia and Hungary would be good candidates for small, EDEN-aligned states, and Poland and Romania might be good choices for Phoenix-aligned states outside of Europe.

The rationale for the “Natural Enemy” seems a little strange yet familiar. The origin of the bonus against Natural Enemies is presumably a deep-seated racial hatred or prolonged experience with combating one group, learning their mannerisms and strategies. The latter point comes from a source I am familiar with.



Basically this is the Ranger. Now I reserve judgment on people unfamiliar with this class; after all, what do you need another primary fighting class with a truncated ability to cast divine spells for when you already have a Paladin? Anyway, under the basic description of the class, one finds, “a ranger carries grudges against certain types of creatures and looks for opportunities to find and destroy them.” This mechanic presents itself in the following:

“Favored Enemy (Ex): At 1st level, a ranger may select a type of creature from among those given on Table 3-14: Ranger Favored Enemies. Due to his extensive study on his chosen type of foe and training in the proper techniques for combating such creatures, the ranger gains a +2 bonus on Bluff, Listen, Sense Motive, Spot, and Survival checks when using these skills against creatures of this type. Likewise, he gets a +2 bonus on weapon damage rolls against such creatures.”



Of course they gain a second favored enemy at level five, a third at level 10, a fourth at level 15, and a fifth at level 20. The bonus to weapon damage is likely much more useful than the bonuses related to tracking your enemy, especially in the open wars of eRepublik where the enemies are presented to you.

The other alternative – some kind of racial hatred – seems incompatible with the laws against racism. It also seems somehow socially backward to think that, say, the relationship between Kobolds and Gnomes is akin to Germans and Poles. The background of that bad blood is a story involving Garl Glittergold, a Gnomish god, who allegedly collapsed a Kobold mine as a prank, and this mine happened to contain Kurtulmak, who went on to become the Kobold deity. Presumably people would have better ability to overcome race-driven prejudice, but maybe not.

The analogy works something like this:


Kobold

is to


Gnome

as


Pole

is to


German

I guess there's a chance the Polish want to avenge an injustice inflicted on their pantheon by a German, or perhaps that explanation better suits the Chinese and the Pakistanis. Maybe the Chinese have been training for months in secret to learn the ways of the Pakistanis and the best way to kill them from a distance. Or, perhaps, it's something to shake the citizens and nations up on top of a long list of recent changes.

Or maybe admin was in a cave collapsed by Garl Glittergold.