Don’t you know there’s a War on?: A Report on the War between CODE and Asteria
Betafoxtrot
Recently the eUK has been treated to a rare event barely seen in our isles - an interview with an outside politician, giving us a glimpse into the fact there is more happening in the game than our own training wars. As has happened for the vast majority of the games life, there is a tug of war going on between two mighty rival alliances - CODE and Asteria. Whilst it may appear to many as pretty quiet on the Western Front, it appears as though there are political events happening and making waves that threaten to upset the balance of power between the two juggernauts.
If you speak to older players about alliances (and I have!) they will tell you that alliances always rise, and always fall. I myself was a part of the largest alliance in eHistory, The World Order, and got the opportunity to see how alliances actually function. Recent events and membership changes of CODE have led to widespread speculation that they might be on the precipice of a ‘fall’. It is going to be an interesting year and as much as only time will tell if CODE goes the way of ATLANTIS, (Or PEACE, or Phoenix, or indeed TWO) I have summarised recent events below and will consider what they mean for geopolitics.
This month Asteria have marked their 10th anniversary celebrating a decade of collaboration, strategic planning, and defence. They have celebrated their member nations and their significance in the geopolitical landscape. However, this month has also marked a large shift in the order of things at CODE HQ and possibly the war currently raging.
Five months ago Turkey left CODE, but that has proven not to be the only cracks forming in the alliance.
On the first of February Chile announced they were leaving the alliance in order to pursue neutrality. Decisions for joining or leaving an alliance are handled by an in game congress vote, and the majority voted to leave.
Hungary’s Country President is the most recent person to consider leaving the alliance, which surprised many. The vote went up to leave CODE but finished 7 for and 7 against, meaning mechanically they currently reside in the alliance. The Hungarian President launched the proposal having had concerns for some time around the lack of cohesion and strategic leadership within the alliance, with these recent attacks demonstrating their doubts over CODE’s ability to handle external threats. They do not seem to be looking to a path of neutrality like Slovakia, and the CP pointed fingers at the internal structure of the alliance in a detailed article. Exasperated with the recent expansion of Serbia into Croatia, Hungary feels that Croatia’s actions diverged from the alliance’s objectives which CODE failed to address, citing that as they both attacked Serbia in different regions to try and force them out of the area. Croatia chose to fight in New Zealand forcing Hungary to put damage in both battles alone, and therefore being largely to blame in the eyes of the Hungarian CP for the Serbian incursion into CODE occupied regions.
A long time partner of CODE (but not member) Slovakia has published an article following suit, reiterating their neutrality and introducing some distance between themselves and the alliance. They have made this decision after a year of being a frontline country in the current war. Last year they had been completely wiped from the map and were liberated - and they have become weary and do not want to fight other people's battles. Slovakia sees this as an opportunity to explore their own sovereignty. Despite wanting to be neutral, they are looking to potentially attack other countries if it is in their interests as they do not want to become a TW farm to prevent sucking any remaining fun out of the game.
With Asteria already occupying much of France and launching successful attacks in Greece, some CODE members have voiced their concern.
With the conquest of Croatian regions, there is an increased pressure on members of CODE to coordinate their defences which as discussed, many feel has been lacking. The attack on Croatia forms part of a multi-pronged attack in Northern Hungary and Greek regions which struck a blow to CODE by pushing Croatia out of Albania, where they were threatening Romanian interests in the region and leaving Hungary on the brink of boeing removed from the map. This precipitated Hungary’s proposal to leave, which certainly felt like a key moment to eRepublik’s commentators.
Hungary’s CP took the decision to launch a proposal to leave the alliance to generate discussion of their issues It seems that Hungary, as a historically strong nation, are not concerned about going alone without the blanket of neutrality and are looking ahead to see whether a new alliance might be more appealing suggesting they longterm hope to rival CODE and Asteria.
Greece has also been critical of CODE as they are hit by an Airstrike by the US. They were not happy by the response of CODE in battles between Slovakia and Sweden in which Greece feel that Asteria were putting their full might into the invasion, and there was not the same support from their own alliance for Slovakia and claim that the only real support outside of Slovakia was from France and Greece. They have also criticised Bulgaria for breaching an agreement between France and the US which said that no Franco-American battles were to take place in order to catch France unaware to prevent them France taking the region of Macedonia which is a key region as it would mean that Bulgaria were unable to gain additional borders in the northern region. Romania, a member of Asteria, has said they have chosen the Balkan area as their focus which seems to have caused the disillusion amongst CODE members. Greece is included in this new offensive which has seen multiple regions now under occupation by the alliance.
The Others
A lot will now depend on Hungary and Croatia. If they can decide to continue working with one another and the wider alliance, then other member states would have to be seriously disillusioned to walk away. However, alliance cohesion appears from the outside to be pretty low. If Asteria signalled they weren’t interested in punitive measures against other members, then they might be interested in peeling away and trying their hand as neutral nations.
Likewise it will be interesting to see if CODE leadership changes, or finds its rhythm. With coordination and support being the hot topic of many of the less-content members there’s a chance cohesion can improve across the alliance if a few symbolic victories can be won, or even if multinational efforts to turn a few walls can be pulled off.
The most striking feature of CODE’s internal politics is the sense of alliance cohesion being at an all time low. This appears rooted in poor leadership and coordination. This isn’t something to take lightly, it in fact shows to the world how much a well-coordinated military, nimble damage deployment and decent, knowledgeable leadership can ‘add value’ to a nation, its standing, and its choice of alliance. In a sense this highlights the duality of perma-TW alliances. Yes, training and medal opportunities are important to all nations. But this also serves as an example of when coordination and international cohesion have been diminished by an over-indulgence of the farming playstyle, leaving an entire alliance without an energetic leadership or the ability to deploy damage strategically during war.
An interesting feature of a recent interview with Spanish diplomats also highlights this point - the active diplomatic efforts of Asteria have closed a conflict in Cuba, in part to prevent damage draining. This shows that Asteria are conscious of their battle readiness and are taking direct action on their ability to deploy damage, rather than have it whittled away in battles outside conflict zones.
Silver Linings on the Horizon?
Despite what could be described as a tumultuous past few weeks from CODE, could this have spurred the alliance on to patch their wounds as they attempt to dust themselves off from recent criticisms? Two juggernauts went up against each other causing an air epic in Central Transdanubia between Hungary and Romania, and after a hard fought fight Hungary managed to gain initiative. Is this a turning point and a sign of things to come or the dying breaths of an alliance in disarray? Only time will tell.
An article by the Romanian CP on current events
An article by the Hungarian CP on the recent attacks by Asteria and why they launched a ‘leave alliance’ law
An article by the Greek CP on the attacks on Greece
A declaration of neutrality by Chile
An article from the Serbian CP detailing the counter attacks on CODE and celebrating their achievements
Comments
Wowzer thanks for the summary. This sort of reporting is hard to find these days, nice work.
I think TWO must have come around after I ducked out of alliance politics. I don't remember too much about it anyway, all my alliance memories are dominated by my time in peace phx and one. I'll have to pick your brains sometime about your time in alliance leadership, maybe see if any interesting comparisons can be drawn between our experiences and those of contemporary alliance leaders. Reading about frustrations with coordinating damage and challenges around alliance cohesion brings back fond memories 😉😅
Interesting and well put together article. It’s nice to see someone putting in the effort to put this information out there. o7
Thank you!
This deserves a gold plato reward. Well written
Thank you very much!
excellent report .o?
Thank you!
"With Asteria already occupying much of France......"
LOOOOOOOOL
Have you taken a look at the map?
You’re right it’s written a little confusing on my part, I’ll have to rewrite it. I didn’t mean to imply that when it was published and when you read it that is the case, this has been written over some time and obviously things change so I’ll have to think about how to word that better! But if that’s your only criticism of such a long article then I'll happily take that every day 😃
Ignore the triple smiley I heard it’s an eRep bug 🙃
It's an occupational hazard of writing, I do it quite a lot but the eUK never changes so no one notices ;P
"This month both CODE and Asteria have marked their 10th anniversary"
Code was founded in 2019, it will celebrate its 5th birthday in april.
"perma-TW alliances", wrong. Alliances aren`t for TWs. You don`t need alliances for doing TWs. If alliances do TWs then its in 1st place out of stratetigic needs because TWs replaced on the battlefield and war theaters the function of MPPs.
So... right 😄
You’re right, I’ve corrected - I don’t know where I got that info from. Not sure what you’re getting at on the second point but I appreciate your opinion.
You’re really a negative person
Is that why you made multis SYS?
Because no one else would play with you?
hey spammer clown AMD, nice to meet you, too.
lol nice one
fact is that this article is full of mistakes
And there’s nice ways to point it out
He’s listed his sources and admitted where he is misinformed and corrected it
Instead you choose to be a dick 🤷♂️
.o?
I wish i was playing that game sounds like fun.
What does War mean?
i read every word, well done and much appreciated
Thank you Dougal, much appreciated also 🙂
o7
You can read 2 interviews i have made about the war of Asteria - CODE:
https://www.erepublik.com/he/article/interview-with-the-minister-of-defense-of-eukraine--2772996/1/20
https://www.erepublik.com/he/article/end-of-code-interview-with-the-sofa-of-code-alliance--2772494/1/20
It’s a shame I didn’t read them before, they’d have been great to read to help flesh out parts! Ill have to bare it in mind next time 😁
Interviews with CP and other popular ePlayers might help you next time 😉
Beta, great article! Thank you for your time and efforts to put it all together..
I have to check the previous ones as well!
P.S. And you got yourself a new eSubscriberine 😉
Thanks very much 😁
One hell of an article you pulled together.
Very informative.
v + c + e
Thanks Select!
Argentina could have leave too, but the CP became Dictator to force the current unrest.
Good One o7
Also recent acts of NMKD and Hydra / Serbia and Cuba can be added to all these.
Good job
"Croatia chose to fight in New Zealand forcing Hungary to put damage in both battles alone" try to find the Croatian battle in New Zealand. Spoiler: there were none.
PS. When choosing to put some bs in the article, add quotes or make a fact check if you put it as a precise info 🙂
I think it refers to the reference here https://www.erepublik.com/en/article/code-kil-p-si-t-rv-ny-2776613
It does indeed, and 2 mins fact check would have shown it's fantasies xd
It is also worth mentioning that some countries make decisions without consulting Congress. Some people do not know how to govern a country and think they can govern an alliance.
Also, i would like to add a note about what Poland did as one of the big countries in the game:
.
Teeheehee
Thank you for this article, that surely required a great effort.
Seeing it as an article from a private citizens and not from a source of the government (with more infos at disposition) I think that the recognition of the contribution this article gave to eUK citizens should be kept in more consideration respect some grey points needing some more verifies.
Muy buen artículo.
interesting and funny