the value of war games

Day 539, 01:17 • Published in USA USA • by scrabman

I've been seeing a lot of articles and people railing against War Games lately in comments and otherwise. The opinions range from the 13 year old's articulate "war games are retarded" to the equally versed "we want reel warz." I have found it curious that the war games that started out with such enthusiasm are now taken with such disdain by a vocal minority that seems to grow more and more restless daily. So I wonder if there is some confusion about the purpose of the war games and their alternative ... real war. Namely, I want to address with people the misconception that we are not helping our allies while we engage in war games.

Purpose

War games are the only way for the majority of eUSA citizens to fight without getting into a futile gesture to attack one of our heavily allied neighbors in a battle we would surely lose due to being unsupported in the fight. Starting a real war just for these folks is reckless and wasteful. The war games cost almost nothing compared to the cost of a real war and it gets our citizens into shape for when we do have to fight a real war. I look forward to the day when we can launch a coordinated attack. I thought that was going to be last weekend ... but then things fell apart.

Another effect of the war games is a huge benefit to wellness that we are getting through an increase in our gross national product caused by healthier workers. Further, it is far easier for citizens with low battle stats to train up than it is for Generals like me who have 50,000 points between levels (I'm 1/5 of the way to Field Marshall).

Reel Warz

The stuff being written against war games is largely by people who only have a surface understanding of the levels of diplomacy that happen behind the scenes in this game. They are by people who just want to go to war because they think it will be fun or for lulz. I've been through 3 wars now and they aren't fun when you lose. In fact, they tear the country apart and demoralize us while wrecking our economy. So those who think it will do all these great things ... for the most part ... weren't around for the last couple of times we did that.

The most vocal critics really don't understand that going to war for no good reason will end in disaster. We won't have any support in our war and that will just be a disaster when we run out of funds and guns. I've built a nice war chest with the new national budget and I want it to be used in a war we can win ... or at least one that will help our allies. I work with Romania on a daily basis by sending our troops to support them. Just look at the movements.

Supporting our Allies

Many people seem to be screaming why we aren't supporting our allies. Well I tell you that we are. I am in contact with our allies daily through my top military Generals and personnel like Eugene Harlot, Leroy Combs, Istarlan, and Armandez. We send our troops over seas almost daily. Many people still ask why we don't just attack Russia (including PEACE propagandists).

Going to war with Russia doesn't directly help Romania at this time. So we have been sending our military over to help them but Indo keeps pushing Romania back. I'm not sure what the next steps will be but we are supporting our ally in the way that they are asking us to do. Throwing tons of money into a war that we won't win is not helping them as much as sending our military to directly help them is. However, if they do get to a point where an attack on Russia, France, or Portugal will help them then I am prepared to do that. So far Romania has not asked for that level of support because we haven't found a time when it would be helpful.

Understanding MPPs and how Alliances Work

I have gotten a lot of questions from people about why we don't use our MPPs to conquer Russia/France/Portugal etc. Well, that is because MPPs don't work that way. MPPs only activate when another nation attacks you on your native territory. So if we attacked and took some part of France (activating their MPPs) and they counterattacked and took it back then none of our MPPs would activate. They would have to actually attack us on our home soil for our MPPs to activate. Until then we are fighting alone and we aren't strong enough and don't have enough money to face down 10 other nations by ourselves and all of the nations on our borders have at least 8 or 9 MPPs leaving us to fight an impossible battle.

That is the nature of war in eRep. Without a border you can't go to war unless one of your MPPs activate in another country and that only happens if a nation like Croatia is attacked on their home soil (which happened two weeks ago and we protected them by repelling the attack). One of the good things about having so many MPPs is that we can actually fight in other countries if anyone will ever trigger one of them such as if Sweden actually did attack Germany or if Indo hits Romania on their home territory. Indo has been very careful about this so far which is more of the frustration that our citizens face with the issue of real war. Still, if an MPP ever did activate it is a bargain at 30 gold compared to the 65-75 gold cost of most war games battles.

Conclusion

There is more to this game than fighting and conquest. It is a social strategy game as much as it is about tactics, economics, resource management, and many other aspects. To look at this game from a one dimensional approach is a mistake. I have worked hard to build a war chest and I will not have it wasted just because the nation is restless to get into "real battles." We will fight to win or we won't fight at all and I will continue to send our troops overseas whenever possible. These are both things that I campaigned on way back when I first ran for President and I stand by them today.

Thank you.

scrab - eUSA President