Teacup Special: Campaign Article: Yang Wenli for Virginia
Day 670, 16:12
•
Published in USA 
•
by
•
by Yang Wenli
My fellow eAmericans:
3 days ago, I announced my intention to run for congress in Virginia. In the past 3 days, I've been reading as much as I could, soliciting advice from my mentor and friends, and drafting my campaign article. Earlier today, the exciting work came to a heartening pause because our country regained the initiative to attack. We retook Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois and Kansas, all in one day! After 3 days of long waiting, once again, the Map of eUSA is updated with liberated states and we stepped closer to the complete restoration of our country. Bravo, eUSA!
As I am ready to present you my platform, I remember clearly that on the day when I made up my mind to be a candidate, I was a bit overexcited like many first-time candidates would be. I posted the link to my announcement on IRC eUSA-Chat. An ataractic response popped up almost immediately: "newbie wants to make a difference". Thanks to that response for chilling my brains, getting me to think twice about my commitment, and as a result, finishing the article that you are about to read.
Contents
I. The Greatness of eUSA
- As the second largest country by population, we would be invincible if half of our population are following DoD Orders and staying in the loop by using eUSforum.
II. The Future of eUSA
- Don't underestimate newbies, don't stereotype newbies.
III. The Potential of Civilian Fighters
- 10 Lieutenants with Q1 Weapons and Strength 5.0 deal bigger damage than 1 Field Marshal with Q5 Weapon and Strength 20.0, and the former will definitely come cheaper and sooner.
IV. Accountability: Ethics and Security
- If one failed to protect himself, he is most likely failed to protect his own country.
V. Infrastructure
- Only choose between Q5 Hospital and no hospital at all.
VI. Taxation
- In-game taxation is a weapon, and there's a chance for any weapon to backfire.
VII. Diplomacy
- "Keep our friends close, but our enemies closer".
VIII. Games Are Meant to Be Fun
- We need Department of Fun as much as we need Department of Education.
IX. Acknowledgements
________
I. The Greatness of eUSA
(a) The greatness of an eCountry depends on its active, educated, and cooperative citizens.
(b) During war, we were forced to help people moving to Q5 Hospital state, subscribing DoD Orders, and joining on eUSforum. These efforts should be enhanced, not reduced, when our situation is getting better.
As of today, eUSA is standing as the second largest country by population. We have over 16,000 citizens excluding our patriotic expats. Over 9,000 of them are residing in Florida, our legendary fortress. By fighting this prolonged WWIII against PEACE, our nation became even stronger, even more united, and once again "gave proof through the night that our flag was still there."
However, the game proved itself again and again that it is not population that matters; it is active and educated population that matters. It is still too soon for us to celebrate while seeing the following statistics:
- Among 16K of our citizens, only 9.3K citizens are in the state with Q5 Hospital. 40% of our citizens are living in states with no Hospital at all;
- Among 16K of our citizens, only 4.6K citizens (including organizations) subscribed DoD Orders. 70% of our citizens did not;
- Among 16K of our citizens, only 4.9K members exist in eUSforum.com. 70% of our citizens are not being a part of our great national forum that helps.
As much as I believe in the greatness of eUSA, I believe it could be even greater. I've been constantly adding embedded links to DoD Orders and eUSforum in almost all of my Teacup Journal articles, and I will keep doing so. As for moving people to our fortress state, this ongoing war forced us to utilize every resource, every newspaper to get citizens back from enemy occupied states, over the last month, the population in our Q5 hospital state went up by thousands, thanks to the war!
Now, our time is not as desperate as it was a month ago, but we are still at war, and every bit counts, as always. It is the time for us to see into the future: the greatness of an eCountry depends on its active, educated, and cooperative citizens, and we should always get our citizens informed, encouraged and guided on best effort basis even when this war comes to an end with our complete victory.
II. The Future of eUSA
(a) "The future has not been written," the better we accommodate new citizens in eUSA, the bigger chance we will have for our future. Like fighting our war, every bit counts.
(b) Baby boom is great only when we are ready for it. (Take a look at eFrance if you don't know what I'm talking about)
As I came to this topic, there's a long list of cool stuff in my min
I understand that at times, we are frustrated by inactive and/or ignorant new players. Nevertheless, the bias against newbies is just common in almost all online games. However, as I stated above, the future lies with them, and I strongly believe that being tolerant (or even over-tolerant to some) is the key to success. Here are a few facts that'd better illustrate my point:
- Unlike many other online games that newbies can irritate high-level players by repeatedly begging for things and asking stupid questions, etc. eRepublik newbies are just quiet (even mute) due to game mechanics. When newbies have nobody on friend list but the "admin", and no clue about where to find people to add, nobody will hear their shouts, that kind of "loneliness" is just deadly boring.
- There's nothing more to do except "2-clicks" for the first 6 days, and without certain context, in-game newspapers could be just as boring.
- The in-game forum / wiki are not helpful / newbie-friendly in general due to various reasons.
- Over the last 2 days, I've seen enough Level 6-14 newbies with low Wellness, minimal total damage and less than 10 friends.
Thus, my point is here: we've done a lot for our newbies, and we can still do more.
I will be, and I encourage everyone to be as tolerant as possible to newbies, proactively support them like they are going to be another congressional candidate within 1 month, giving them as many "second-chance" as possible even if they messed up their wellness in your company, said stupid things in your thread, ignored your kind PM for help, fought in the wrong battle, or made the above mistakes all over again. Just give them a second chance because it is about our future.
III. The Potential of Civilian Fighters
(a) Not everyone can play long enough to be a Tank. Everyone can play good enough to be a valuable civilian fighter.
(b) DoD Orders is simply not enough to fully mobilize the potential of civilian fighters.
As I've stated in Part I, "Among 16K of our citizens, only 4.6K citizens (and organizations) subscribed DoD Orders. 70% of our citizens did not." As much as we want those non-subscribers to listen, we have to understand that a lot of players don't even know what the "Subscribe" button is for and where to check the subscribed articles. In fact, it took me a while, maybe 1 week after I reached Level 5 to fully understand what DoD wants me to do.
To fully mobilize the potential of civilian fighters, I'd suggest (as I did before on eUSforum):
(a) Have our GMs (business owners) to act like "militia platoon leaders" and combat tutors, to call on your employees to fight, at least when there's a crucial battle; to teach your employees about fighting mechanics and wellness management. There are guides out there already, take some time to put it in your company welcome letter and/or shout it occasionally.
(b) Add budget to DoD or other military organizations, and encourage citizens / organizations to post citizen ads that link to DoD Orders front-page (http://www.erepublik.com/en/newspaper/dod-orders-194506/1).
IV. Accountability: Ethics and Security
(a) Game ethics should not be ridiculed by saying "it's just a game".
(b) Due to the special nature of eRepublik, in-game (account) security concerns not only the citizen or the organization owner, but also everyone around you.
I have nothing more to add to this point but a promise: I will uphold game ethics, carry out my duties, and be extremely careful with classified information, in-game passwords and computer security. I will also keep my eyes open for imposture organizations and all kinds of traps.
V. Infrastructure
(a) Game mechanics speaks. "Home state love" is sweet and admirable but doesn't count.
(b) Maybe not instantly, but we need at least 1 more Q5 Hospital state with 2 kinds of high Raw Material (Oil and Grain) in order to best deploy our defense by population and get a solid economic stronghold. Comparing to the strategic timing and the massive population movement, I believe building the Q5 is the easiest part of the story.
(c) Any hospital other than Q5 is a waste of money.
I have nothing more to add to this point.
VI. Taxation
Facts:
(a) An average young citizen can hardly afford a weapon a day with daily salary;
(b) A big proportion of GMs are not paying the income tax at all by doing money-shipping in MM;
(c) We are still on tight budget to finance our tanks, welfare programs and infrastructures.
My standpoints:
(a) Discussing this issue by separating war time and peace time leads to prioritizing military or civilian, which I humbly disagree. Fighting is an essential part of the game to get quick experience levels (extra Gold), high wellness for productivity, and high military ranks to deal bigger damage, so it should be everyone's concern. (Also see Part III. The Potential of Civilian Fighters)
(b) Taxation is about how we use it as a leverage to coordinate following goals for our country:
- Sufficient income for National Treasury;
- Stabilizing our market;
- Supporting our GMs and employees instead of squeezing them;
- Preventing our enemies from shipping cheap products to facilitate their war against us or pouring products / RM into our market and destroy our economy;
(c) Based on above standpoints, I tend to support a balanced taxation adjustment, a win-win proposition for the government, GMs and employees. However, I still need time to do my mathematical research on this issue, and I will come back to this discussion in future articles.
VII. Diplomacy
(a) We should treat our allies in this ongoing war as lifetime friends;
(b) We should NOT treat our enemies in this ongoing war as lifetime enemies; It'd be wise for us to let bygones be bygones when this war is over, an
(c) Watch out for those countries huddled with "serious" players who take RL politics and hatred into this game, who believe nothing but pure lust of ePower, eTotalitarianism and Gold, given enough time, those countries will most likely become the next PEACE;
(d) When the ongoing war is over with our complete victory, we should arrange "training wars" with our allies on daily basis to further enhance our average rank and experience;
(e) Encourage average eAmericans to become "civilian ambassadors", to make friends with people from various countries, allied or not, and perhaps to import and translate non-English articles. It is always good to know what others think, especially the enemies.
VIII. Games Are Meant to Be Fun
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d) ^O^
...
(z) LOL
Enough said! XD
IX. Acknowledgements
Thanks to ligtreb and Eugene Harlot for encouraging me to run for congress in my second month of eLife and thanks to USWP for giving me the honor to run under the banner; thanks to Chocolate McSkittles for being my "unofficial" mentor all the way and giving me the incredible support, instruction, understanding and trust; thanks to James Skyrider for interviewing me yesterday. The interview was very well planned; it inspired me in many ways and helped me to reorganize my thoughts into the article above.
Finally, thanks to all of you for reading my article.
I am Yang Wenli, a Level 16 Captain. Vote for me in Virginia, and I won't let you down.
Sincerely,
Yang Wenli
Candidate for eUSA Congress
________
In other news:
A third "GET OFF MY PLANE" call has been thrown to one of our enemies, this time, eColombia! O7 to all RW fighters! Good to see our southern border secured.
________
Previous articles:
> Teacup Announcement: My Announcement as a Candidate for Congress
> Teacup Guide: A Guide to Civilian Fighters
> Teacup Special: New Border Connection Maps Released
> Teacup Guide: A Protective Guide to Job Hunting
> Teacup Special: A Month to Remember; A Map to Remember
> Teacup Interview: Teacup Interview: Bill Brasky, Secretary of DoE, a Mentor
________
3 days ago, I announced my intention to run for congress in Virginia. In the past 3 days, I've been reading as much as I could, soliciting advice from my mentor and friends, and drafting my campaign article. Earlier today, the exciting work came to a heartening pause because our country regained the initiative to attack. We retook Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois and Kansas, all in one day! After 3 days of long waiting, once again, the Map of eUSA is updated with liberated states and we stepped closer to the complete restoration of our country. Bravo, eUSA!
As I am ready to present you my platform, I remember clearly that on the day when I made up my mind to be a candidate, I was a bit overexcited like many first-time candidates would be. I posted the link to my announcement on IRC eUSA-Chat. An ataractic response popped up almost immediately: "newbie wants to make a difference". Thanks to that response for chilling my brains, getting me to think twice about my commitment, and as a result, finishing the article that you are about to read.
Contents
I. The Greatness of eUSA
- As the second largest country by population, we would be invincible if half of our population are following DoD Orders and staying in the loop by using eUSforum.
II. The Future of eUSA
- Don't underestimate newbies, don't stereotype newbies.
III. The Potential of Civilian Fighters
- 10 Lieutenants with Q1 Weapons and Strength 5.0 deal bigger damage than 1 Field Marshal with Q5 Weapon and Strength 20.0, and the former will definitely come cheaper and sooner.
IV. Accountability: Ethics and Security
- If one failed to protect himself, he is most likely failed to protect his own country.
V. Infrastructure
- Only choose between Q5 Hospital and no hospital at all.
VI. Taxation
- In-game taxation is a weapon, and there's a chance for any weapon to backfire.
VII. Diplomacy
- "Keep our friends close, but our enemies closer".
VIII. Games Are Meant to Be Fun
- We need Department of Fun as much as we need Department of Education.
IX. Acknowledgements
________
I. The Greatness of eUSA
(a) The greatness of an eCountry depends on its active, educated, and cooperative citizens.
(b) During war, we were forced to help people moving to Q5 Hospital state, subscribing DoD Orders, and joining on eUSforum. These efforts should be enhanced, not reduced, when our situation is getting better.
As of today, eUSA is standing as the second largest country by population. We have over 16,000 citizens excluding our patriotic expats. Over 9,000 of them are residing in Florida, our legendary fortress. By fighting this prolonged WWIII against PEACE, our nation became even stronger, even more united, and once again "gave proof through the night that our flag was still there."
However, the game proved itself again and again that it is not population that matters; it is active and educated population that matters. It is still too soon for us to celebrate while seeing the following statistics:
- Among 16K of our citizens, only 9.3K citizens are in the state with Q5 Hospital. 40% of our citizens are living in states with no Hospital at all;
- Among 16K of our citizens, only 4.6K citizens (including organizations) subscribed DoD Orders. 70% of our citizens did not;
- Among 16K of our citizens, only 4.9K members exist in eUSforum.com. 70% of our citizens are not being a part of our great national forum that helps.
As much as I believe in the greatness of eUSA, I believe it could be even greater. I've been constantly adding embedded links to DoD Orders and eUSforum in almost all of my Teacup Journal articles, and I will keep doing so. As for moving people to our fortress state, this ongoing war forced us to utilize every resource, every newspaper to get citizens back from enemy occupied states, over the last month, the population in our Q5 hospital state went up by thousands, thanks to the war!
Now, our time is not as desperate as it was a month ago, but we are still at war, and every bit counts, as always. It is the time for us to see into the future: the greatness of an eCountry depends on its active, educated, and cooperative citizens, and we should always get our citizens informed, encouraged and guided on best effort basis even when this war comes to an end with our complete victory.
II. The Future of eUSA
(a) "The future has not been written," the better we accommodate new citizens in eUSA, the bigger chance we will have for our future. Like fighting our war, every bit counts.
(b) Baby boom is great only when we are ready for it. (Take a look at eFrance if you don't know what I'm talking about)
As I came to this topic, there's a long list of cool stuff in my min
😛Meals on Wheels, Welcoming Committee, Mentorship Program, Fort Harlot, etc. IMHO, the dedicated eAmericans behind those great projects are true heroes; they are the salt of the earth and the backbone of our future. With my gratitude and faith, I shall give nothing less than my full support, as a citizen and as a congressional candidate.
I understand that at times, we are frustrated by inactive and/or ignorant new players. Nevertheless, the bias against newbies is just common in almost all online games. However, as I stated above, the future lies with them, and I strongly believe that being tolerant (or even over-tolerant to some) is the key to success. Here are a few facts that'd better illustrate my point:
- Unlike many other online games that newbies can irritate high-level players by repeatedly begging for things and asking stupid questions, etc. eRepublik newbies are just quiet (even mute) due to game mechanics. When newbies have nobody on friend list but the "admin", and no clue about where to find people to add, nobody will hear their shouts, that kind of "loneliness" is just deadly boring.
- There's nothing more to do except "2-clicks" for the first 6 days, and without certain context, in-game newspapers could be just as boring.
- The in-game forum / wiki are not helpful / newbie-friendly in general due to various reasons.
- Over the last 2 days, I've seen enough Level 6-14 newbies with low Wellness, minimal total damage and less than 10 friends.
Thus, my point is here: we've done a lot for our newbies, and we can still do more.
I will be, and I encourage everyone to be as tolerant as possible to newbies, proactively support them like they are going to be another congressional candidate within 1 month, giving them as many "second-chance" as possible even if they messed up their wellness in your company, said stupid things in your thread, ignored your kind PM for help, fought in the wrong battle, or made the above mistakes all over again. Just give them a second chance because it is about our future.
III. The Potential of Civilian Fighters
(a) Not everyone can play long enough to be a Tank. Everyone can play good enough to be a valuable civilian fighter.
(b) DoD Orders is simply not enough to fully mobilize the potential of civilian fighters.
As I've stated in Part I, "Among 16K of our citizens, only 4.6K citizens (and organizations) subscribed DoD Orders. 70% of our citizens did not." As much as we want those non-subscribers to listen, we have to understand that a lot of players don't even know what the "Subscribe" button is for and where to check the subscribed articles. In fact, it took me a while, maybe 1 week after I reached Level 5 to fully understand what DoD wants me to do.
To fully mobilize the potential of civilian fighters, I'd suggest (as I did before on eUSforum):
(a) Have our GMs (business owners) to act like "militia platoon leaders" and combat tutors, to call on your employees to fight, at least when there's a crucial battle; to teach your employees about fighting mechanics and wellness management. There are guides out there already, take some time to put it in your company welcome letter and/or shout it occasionally.
(b) Add budget to DoD or other military organizations, and encourage citizens / organizations to post citizen ads that link to DoD Orders front-page (http://www.erepublik.com/en/newspaper/dod-orders-194506/1).
IV. Accountability: Ethics and Security
(a) Game ethics should not be ridiculed by saying "it's just a game".
(b) Due to the special nature of eRepublik, in-game (account) security concerns not only the citizen or the organization owner, but also everyone around you.
I have nothing more to add to this point but a promise: I will uphold game ethics, carry out my duties, and be extremely careful with classified information, in-game passwords and computer security. I will also keep my eyes open for imposture organizations and all kinds of traps.
V. Infrastructure
(a) Game mechanics speaks. "Home state love" is sweet and admirable but doesn't count.
(b) Maybe not instantly, but we need at least 1 more Q5 Hospital state with 2 kinds of high Raw Material (Oil and Grain) in order to best deploy our defense by population and get a solid economic stronghold. Comparing to the strategic timing and the massive population movement, I believe building the Q5 is the easiest part of the story.
(c) Any hospital other than Q5 is a waste of money.
I have nothing more to add to this point.
VI. Taxation
Facts:
(a) An average young citizen can hardly afford a weapon a day with daily salary;
(b) A big proportion of GMs are not paying the income tax at all by doing money-shipping in MM;
(c) We are still on tight budget to finance our tanks, welfare programs and infrastructures.
My standpoints:
(a) Discussing this issue by separating war time and peace time leads to prioritizing military or civilian, which I humbly disagree. Fighting is an essential part of the game to get quick experience levels (extra Gold), high wellness for productivity, and high military ranks to deal bigger damage, so it should be everyone's concern. (Also see Part III. The Potential of Civilian Fighters)
(b) Taxation is about how we use it as a leverage to coordinate following goals for our country:
- Sufficient income for National Treasury;
- Stabilizing our market;
- Supporting our GMs and employees instead of squeezing them;
- Preventing our enemies from shipping cheap products to facilitate their war against us or pouring products / RM into our market and destroy our economy;
(c) Based on above standpoints, I tend to support a balanced taxation adjustment, a win-win proposition for the government, GMs and employees. However, I still need time to do my mathematical research on this issue, and I will come back to this discussion in future articles.
VII. Diplomacy
(a) We should treat our allies in this ongoing war as lifetime friends;
(b) We should NOT treat our enemies in this ongoing war as lifetime enemies; It'd be wise for us to let bygones be bygones when this war is over, an
😛
(c) Watch out for those countries huddled with "serious" players who take RL politics and hatred into this game, who believe nothing but pure lust of ePower, eTotalitarianism and Gold, given enough time, those countries will most likely become the next PEACE;
(d) When the ongoing war is over with our complete victory, we should arrange "training wars" with our allies on daily basis to further enhance our average rank and experience;
(e) Encourage average eAmericans to become "civilian ambassadors", to make friends with people from various countries, allied or not, and perhaps to import and translate non-English articles. It is always good to know what others think, especially the enemies.
VIII. Games Are Meant to Be Fun
(a)
🙂
(b)
😃
(c)
🙂
(d) ^O^
...
(z) LOL
Enough said! XD
IX. Acknowledgements
Thanks to ligtreb and Eugene Harlot for encouraging me to run for congress in my second month of eLife and thanks to USWP for giving me the honor to run under the banner; thanks to Chocolate McSkittles for being my "unofficial" mentor all the way and giving me the incredible support, instruction, understanding and trust; thanks to James Skyrider for interviewing me yesterday. The interview was very well planned; it inspired me in many ways and helped me to reorganize my thoughts into the article above.
Finally, thanks to all of you for reading my article.
I am Yang Wenli, a Level 16 Captain. Vote for me in Virginia, and I won't let you down.
Sincerely,
Yang Wenli
Candidate for eUSA Congress
________
In other news:
A third "GET OFF MY PLANE" call has been thrown to one of our enemies, this time, eColombia! O7 to all RW fighters! Good to see our southern border secured.
________
Previous articles:
> Teacup Announcement: My Announcement as a Candidate for Congress
> Teacup Guide: A Guide to Civilian Fighters
> Teacup Special: New Border Connection Maps Released
> Teacup Guide: A Protective Guide to Job Hunting
> Teacup Special: A Month to Remember; A Map to Remember
> Teacup Interview: Teacup Interview: Bill Brasky, Secretary of DoE, a Mentor
________
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Twitter
Discord
Comments
first?
I love the sections. 😃 Good luck!
Excellent. I wholly support your candidacy. This presentation is as clear as any I have ever seen and gives everyone full insight as to where you stand on the key issues facing our country today.
Highly commendable.
Damn, nice campaign article. This guy's a serious and good choice for Congress.
You'll be a great addition to Congress, Yang!
Is there anything you don't take seriously Yang? You're crazy. 😛
I told you that you'd eventually run. I probably lost the PM though.
good luck!
Woot! Go Yang!
Good luck Yang!
Yang is amazing!
Well written sir. I have no doubts regarding the results of the virginia election 😃
RE: Chocolate McSkittles: I DO. The congressman from Virginia, could be, ...... an eFrench! XD
Dear sweet Jesus, and I thought MY campaign article was detailed! Voted and Good Luck!
Voted
Awesome dude. think i'll take a day trip to Virginia on election day! 😉
This article is win.
Good Luck
Cool. Yang for Virginia!
Yang for prez in November 2009!!
Yang for prez!
Yang if you don't win Virginia is nuts. To see you go from your first badass post to what you are today is a testament to how every new player should approach this game. You've earned the respect of damn near everyone because you listened and you learned.
Good luck! I hope to be there with you too!
My god, we really need to do something about the lack of people subbing the DOD. Hopefully a good number of those not subbed read it in the top news.
I've been incredibly impressed by your articles and ideas. Best of luck to you!
"We should NOT treat our enemies in this ongoing war as lifetime enemies; It'd be wise for us to let bygones be bygones when this war is over..."
Voted.
Voted
Good Luck, Godspeed!, and love your avi pic!
LOGH rocks!
even the congressional budget office agrees :3
Awesome platform! Go Yang!
Yang should run for Country President next election!
I think you have a unique name. I also like talking to you and glad our country has players like you to help us. I seemed to have hit a glass ceiling when it comes to the expansion of my knowledge of this game. I probably could write some article like that and have the free time to be a congressmen but I just don't feel like it at this point and time. Kinda like RL more 😃. Good luck Yang you're red HOT right now!
In my brief time knowing you, you've demonstrated a keen mind and real dedication to the good of this country. It's also high past time for the new generation -- those of us who've "come of age" during the upheavals of the world war -- to make our voices heard.
You'll make a fine Senator.
How have I not commented in this yet? Yang Wenli is god, if you don't win Virginia I will, like, quit. I would vote for you if I wasn't running in South Carolina myself. You'd make an exceptional senator, best of luck from a former Army Major and Canadian Minister of Awesomeness.
Nice Job.
Yang is the very model of a dedicated eRep player. He has everything it takes to carry our nation forward. If you are in Virginia on Friday you must vote for Yang Wenli.