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”But are not this struggle and even the mistakes one may make better, and do they not develop us more, than if we kept systematically away from emotions?”
- Vincent Van Gogh
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During my stay in the world of eRepublik, I've had a unique...joy, to follow people's, especially certain people's emotional responses to various matters ranging from social and economic to military matters. Let it be discussion about relations between two countries, donations regarding attack costs, or decisions to abandon certain battles in order to win another ones. In very few cases the discussions have been fully rational and painless, as the other side always has some sentiments and a case to argue about it. Sometimes the point to argue about is a rational one. Sometimes it is not. Emotions can be of great use as a driving force to generate joy and unity amongst people to rally for an objective, but they can also be the biggest disadvantage a country can have if they are in the way of a solution that would benefit the majority at the cost of an object of emotional value.


Passing through core regions – a violation of sovereignty?


The view about value of regions regarding their inviolability has changed during the history of eRepublik. I remember back during the early days of V1 how it was regarded that violation of country's core regions was a tabu amongst citizens – no swapping was to ever be permitted amongst allies because of the nationalistic sentiment to not let any country pass through their cores. It was, and in some places still is, totally unacceptable among the hard-core right wingers to let anyone violate their country's integrity.

I understand the sentiment not to let an enemy country gain any hold in your own country. But that I cannot understand how people stubbornly argue against a friendly country passing through your country as a temporary measure to gain a strategic advantage in a war situation. These cases have been present throughout eRepublik's history. I believe the latest case is between Serbia and Indonesia (but which I'm not sure of because I did not follow the situation). Back when I was President in eFinland, I was presented with a plan to let Norway swap through several Finland's core regions in order to launch blocking attacks against Russia, so the United States would gain initiative in the Russian front. I made the decision to allow the swaps, and thus USA gained initiative against Russia, which served as a turning point in WW3, and allowed USA to win the war. The decision to let another country violate Finland's soil raised public stir at first, but it soon after calmed down due to the massive cheering coming from abroad, because the decision to allow the swaps had won us the World War.

Later on, similar sentiments have been highly detrimental to war efforts. I have some cases to present about reluctance to allow swapping through other countries, which have disallowed certain military maneuvers, but which I in this instance leave uncovered. Instead, I'll skip on to discussing about the emotional value people associate with regions.


Emotional value of regions


Back in June, 2010, when there was only two days till the launch of V2 and a week-long period of non-combat phase, Hungary and Serbia attacked Croatia with their activated MPP sets. Due to EDEN efforts to maintain those countries blocked, Serbia could not attack Croatia at the same time as Hungary and Slovenia did, thus buying Croatia some time. Due to coinciding plans, EDEN happened to be ready for the initial attack by Hungary into Northwest Croatia, and at daychange mobiles hit on Croatia's side, lessening the impact Hungary's attack had made. But, regardless of that, during the day it became apparent that the region would be lost, no matter if we continued to defend it or not, so I made the call to direct MPPs to defend other regions in Slovenian front and in South Africa, and the same command was given to armies. As it turned out, on that day, all the other battles were won, except the battle for Northwest Croatia.

The outrage following from that call was huge in Croatian leadership. They had given Northwest Croatia big sentimental value, and had wanted for us to defend that region at all costs, not minding anything else. Had I done that, we'd have lost all the battles on that day – the battles between Slovenia and Croatia, battle for Northern Cape in South Africa, and the battle for Northwest Croatia – simply because we had no damage enough to win that one particular battle. I made the call based on that information, and I had told that to Croatians, but they didn't care. The next day, when Serbia slipped the block and attacked Slavonia, the Croatians insisted on EDEN defending solely that region. That we did, and again the same, we didn't have enough damage to win the fight, so we lost every battle the second day in the Slovenian front, Russia and in Poland, where Russia had attacked Pomerania. Had we concentrated the defence effort similarly on the second day too, the fight for Croatian regions would have spanned over congress elections, not giving Croatia free citizenship (do note though that eventually the tactic to RW Croatian regions back just before congress elections would have been successful in preventing that too, but the admin intervention to cancel those RWs killed that tactic).


The new war module – what's the difference between core regions and non-core regions now?


That was one example of how emotions can hurt strategic objectives. Maybe not the best one, but it was one I wanted to share. What I want to address now in the new war module is, how the all-around active MPPs affect visualised perceptive difference between core regions and non-core regions. Now that MPPs are active in defence and offence, whether the attacking/defending country has activated them or not, it is strange to see how people still argue for the importance of defending core regions. For instance, now that there are several fronts open around the world, and people argue which battles are to be prioritised, some people still argue that the defending core battles take priority instead of some obviously important strategic choke point regions, just because they are core regions. I can not see the point there. If we think in game mechanical terms now what difference do core regions and non-core regions hold, the only difference that pops out is that in non-core region you can start an RW. That's the big difference those two region types hold. As long as you have a country under your feet, prioritizing a core region over non-core, if the non-core region holds bigger strategic value, is plain emotional argumentation, and potentially detrimental.


The changing view on untouchability of regions


As we've seen, the more time has passed and history has been written, the more people's views regarding the astonishment and resentment caused by violations of their country's sovereignty have changed. During the first days swappings were almost impossible due to the negative sentiment they aroused, but at the last days of V1 and V2, swaps were almost common day. Now swaps are no longer possible, and the only lingering emotional responses regions can arouse are caused by the two cases I presented above. Based on history, and the view of how successful each country has been regarded, I dare to argue that the less a country, or an alliance has been led with emotion, the more successful it has been. Basing objectives in nationalistic goals, or petty hatreds has led to little to no gain in wars, but on the other hand, purely game mechanical, economical or strategic objectives based on benefit gained for the country from them have always payed off. Countries inside alliances arguing just for their own goals to be satisfied at the expense of strategic goals that would benefit the entire alliance, can shatter the functionality of the alliance, which has been seen several times in the past (I'm looking at you, Phoenix).


Final words


Emotions can be of great benefit for a nation to rally them towards a goal. I doubt eRepublik would have a fraction of players it has if it wasn't for the nationalistic aspect the game has. At that level, amongst the masses, are a great driving factor and a booster for baby booms. But at leadership level, the same matter turns into a handicap. At an alliance level this is painfully apparent, as leading an alliance is about making the rational decisions that benefit the whole, not pursuing goals set by individual countries that serve the needs of a few.

Yet, this is what the entire game is about. Emotions. Every military conflict this game has ever had, is based on emotional responses and real life sentiments. See the Romanian-Hungarian war – what other driving force does that conflict have except the real life induced sentiments that both sides have? Why else did Russians invade North America? It's been the same always, and will be till the end of this game. Military campaigns based on purely strategic and game mechanical objectives are not feasible in this game because this game is played by humans, not machines pure of logic. If this game was all about pure logic, no drain battle would work, every country inside one alliance would pull together with no contradiction, - and the game would be dead boring. Emotions and passion to be a part of your own country's success are the heart of eRepublik – when that dies out, there is no more eRepublik. This is partially why I consider myself an outsider and a dying breed in this game, like the rest of the Finns. I have no passion, no emotions to commandeer me. But that is also what made me do these observations about this game, and when I've read all the armchair strategists' views on how the world should be run, this one quote comes to my mind every time:

”When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion.” -Dale Carnegie.

It probably is the reason why everything did not go as you'd have wanted it to go.


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Avec