Doesn’t look like it’s had all that much activity (unless, of course, there was more on the old forums), that’s probably how it slipped through the cracks
Well, population is subjective. They could consist of a species that has a shorter lifespan, less physically adept, etc. that could warrant a population of 400 quadrillion. Like the Colonus bugs or something. (Reason #84 why we shouldn’t have a population cap)
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And I Quote,
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I had some long, rambling response written out because I’m tired right now (and it’s about 1 am as I post this), but I decided I’d just rewrite it and make it more sense-making and concise (hopefully).
As the creator of the Colonus bugs, I have to agree that differing standards for different species would be pretty cool. If we were to just drop any informal population limits at a random time, that would inevitably result in a lot of major retconning to make things work (trust me, I had to go out of my way to explain why the Mandi didn’t have more members). Fortunately, as there seems to be general support for a retcon (we’ll still have to wait until the poll to see), this shouldn’t be a big problem. The real problem I have with your proposed rational is that it in itself is subjective, and a bit short-sighted.
First of all, we need to consider reproduction rates, those will absolutely be important as a starting point. Then, we need to understand what all these stats are being compared to, but I’ll just assume it’s humans. From there, we need to understand that species are dynamic. While the mandi were physically short, with shorter lifespans (50 years) and a high reproduction rate, they were also incredibly strong (like ants) and well coordinated (hive mind). You also need to understand the actual traits of the species too. The Mandi were extremely xenophobic to non-invertebrates and excelled in production and the improvement of existing technology. While numbers don’t equal strength, to grant them more numbers would be to directly play into the Mandi’s strengths.
So, to pick 3 important traits for how individual species would be capped, I’d say:
1.) Does it biologically and historically make sense for the species to have that high of a population (could the species reasonably have pumped out and sustained that many members in the given amount of time.
2.) Does that proposed population cap play directly into the species’ strengths, granting significant benefit as compared to the same number of humans (how much more benefit is gained from having x amount of y species instead of x number of humans)
3.) Does the proposed population cap dramatically shift the balance of power in the sector (basically how much more powerful does it make them); does it cause a dramatic shift in how that nation interacts with other nations (basically how does it affect ideology)
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When are we going to figure out that a cap is flawed? No one cap can account for the cultural and biological differences between each country. We need to just trust each other, and if someone comes along that refuses to participate in the verisimilitude of A1-0 then we can just ignore them until they get bored and leave or decide to actually participate. The addition of a cap just makes things less realistic, really—it’s similar to the Streisand effect, where if we tell people a maximum amount of stars or planets or people they can have in their country, then they will place just under the maximum amount of stars or planets or people in their country. Whereas, if we had no cap and just had a general notion of “keep it similar to others, here are some examples:” then the population, planet, and star spread would be far more realistic, and we wouldn’t end up having roughly the same amount of these things in every single country.
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If they put their numbers right below the cap, they’re going to realize real quick that that means their population and expansion numbers are going to stop growing and they’ll stagnate as time progresses. And besides, why don’t we trust our roleplayers to not all go right below the caps? Bigger and badder doesn’t equate to more fun or more valid, it’s how you use those factors in the your roleplays that gives them value. At some point there should be an understanding that we shouldn’t be allowing the statistics to get disgustingly bloated to the point that it’s just a rmb roleplay at its worst.
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If you really trusted everyone here, you wouldn’t be pushing so hard for a cap.
Have you considered that some of that trust was broken when the canon fell apart?
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I think that maverick proved that you can’t trust even the people who’ve been here the longest. We had a system based on trust and what happened? Total collapse, the situation we are in right now. A system should have concrete rules and rely on trust as little as possible. Yeah trust can work 99% of the time, but you need only that 1% to collapse everything, as maverick showed.
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I want to spend my summer here writing cool sci-fi stories with other people, not arguing for months over an asterisk of an asterisk of a cap that doesn’t really matter in the long run but we still need to have before people can start writing functional star nations. I understand the hesitance to trust others as I know we all trusted Mav despite his faults before he pulled the rug out from under us in a tantrum, but we still need to have trust and understand that the majority of people here do not want to see the canon hurt. We all have one goal—to make good stories with each other. What we are doing right now is laying out the foundation for this canon to become what is essentially space D&D. I assume that’s not what the majority of people here want, but if it is then let me know and I’ll be on my way and you can spend the next year working on a rulebook that everyone will hate, and the canon will die.
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As soon as some of the rules were tested, they snapped under pressure. Are we not supposed to do something about that? A1-0 almost died already, there were legit questions about wether to even continue it, because our rules were untested and turned out to be too weak. But sure, go ahead, I’m sure just because you hate it nobody else will ever like it. Oh well, if only there was a place to discuss the proposed news rules to make sure we all get to give our thoughts on it…
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I’m not saying the idea of a cap is terrible. It’s the process that destroys canons. This is exactly what drove Mav out—the transformation of A1-0 into a stats game—and to prevent “another Mav”, whatever that means, you are… doing exactly what drove him out in the first place. It just seems like the complete opposite of what you intend to do.
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My understanding is that what drove Mav out was disagreements with other roleplayers that started to make the roleplay unfun for him, not that people were too stats-driven
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It wasn’t the fact that people were stats-driven, it was the molding of A1-0 into a stats game that caused the disagreements. The entire process devolved into shitslinging on both sides, and instead of taking a step back and saying, “Hey, this caused an issue before, maybe we should look for a different way to do this,” you are trying to double down on this whilst knowing well that you will never be able to get a consensus on the majority of these caps.
I wouldn’t be pursuing this if there wasn’t already some support behind the idea. If people don’t want it they will express that when the time comes to vote. Besides, it becomes very important to address this when a nation that has established itself as very important in a multitude of nation’s lore and has established itself a one of the strongest nations in the sector in every metric is the one that gains the bloated statistcs. At that point you can’t just turn around and ignore them.
If they’re “very important in a multitude of nation’s [sic] lore” and if they have “established [themselves as] one of the strongest nations in the sector in every metric,” then maybe they should have the highest statistics in the sector. After all, if someone can create RP to back up the worldbuilding, then they can make their nation as strong as they want within reason.
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Fam I’m the one who was in a fight with mav and it was people “being too protective of their worldbulding,” or something like that that he blamed. To quote him:
“Cause frankly, my collaboration style clashed with what the community wants and you’re all so uptight about it”
(Won’t send a screenshot cuz this was in DMs and I’ll respect the privacy)
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To an extent, yes, I agree with you. Nations that are very powerful and important have reason to have higher stats, that however only applies to a certain extent. There’s a point in which statistics become unreasonable, regardless of what strength a roleplayer has decided give their nation. I believe there was also a category called “Hyperpower” or something like that, and I want to say there was some discussion on whether to keep it or not, I don’t fully remember though.
This discussion is fun and great and all but can we please move to the New thread so that we can actually make some progress?
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Hey all, sorry for blowing through your notifications, was ripping out all my threads into three categories
serniani-archive - Any content that didn’t make the retcon is listed here
revised-canon-facts - Same as A1-0 Facts, but for the revised canon
revised-canon-rp - Same as A1-0 RPs, but for the revised canon
Apologies, and if the mod panel would like to make official tags I’ll move everything over to them.
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