While We Wait: The Next Generation

[Masada]

Muscovite succession was a family affair, and it didn't get fixed completely until the family died out (actually, even after that we still had the Pseudo-Demetrii) and the smaller and less quarrelsome Koshkiny-Zakharyiny (boyars rather than princes) took over. All that anyone could try to do until then was to limit the familial appanages as much as possible and kill/imprison all nearby relatives in brutal ways, usually preemptively. Though, I suppose the fact that this was actually doable would speak for it no longer being a Mandala state. The earlier Rurikid principalities definitely were closer, but tended to devolve and disintegrate in place of having dynastic shifts, though those happened too.

More or less. Malay states seem prior to Islam to be perennially vulnerable to dynastic squabbles, inter dynastic squabbles and every Johny come lately in perdition.

Actually, Masada, what about the Greek city-states? Sure, their struggles with overpopulation more or less defined their history from what we know, but the impossibility of establishing any large empires seems to be spot on. And what really reminded me of this was the fact that many cities technically moved around in their immediate vicinity for economic purposes, more or less as you described; though it is pure semantics to some extent, perhaps it would be more correct to say that the driving factor of Greek history was not so much overpopulation as poor agriculture and chronic food deficits even by Ancient standards. On the other hand, personal factors matter very little for once (although, Syracuse's empire is a Mandala state if I've ever seen one...). "Greek individualism" indeed.

Greek city-states do have Mandala like traits; you can really see it in the severe difficulty that anyone had in holding onto control after a victory; you could almost infer that any centralizing tendency would be met in short order by a stronger decentralizing tenancy reinforced by things like geography for instance.

Overpopulation isn't quite correct as you've seen, it's carrying capacity seems to have been lower than its population, but it worked around that through the establishment of colonies.

It's a midway between a Mandala anti-Europe and Europe itself.

*

More intelligent conversation is welcome!

 

[Kraznaya]

I thought we already were at Web 2.0. Web 3.0, maybe? Web 2.5?

No, because Civfanatics was still stagnant at 1.0 when the rest of the web moved ahead. We're catching up with the trend.

 

[Kozmos]

The trend blows IMO...I'm not a big one for social networking. In fact you could say I loathe it.

 

[Espoir]

How do I join the Never Ending Stories group?

 

[Kraznaya]

Err, go to this link and click on Join Group?

 

[BananaLee]

At the moment, I really don't see any difference as to how things would be run. And I certainly won't be waiting - with baited breath or otherwise.

 

[Kraznaya]

It's like a shiny new toy, it might get old, but it's still cool when you get to play with it for the first time.

 

[Immaculate]

A note on cranky moderators:

Hi, as many of you know, i am involved in my first ever attempt at moderating a NES and in the past month i have written cranky messages to 3+ players because i get tired of explaining rules that are already posted or else saying "no- thats not possible- just like the first time you asked me- you need X and Y to do what you are asking- just like the first time you asked me".
People don't like to be berated (well, i sure as hell don't want to be) and yet i find myself losing patience with myself (its not the players fault really- they just want to play a game) and i end up 'scolding/berating' a player and feeling bad for it afterwards.

I am sure that other moderators have had similar problems/feelings. Whats an easy solution (besides prozac)?

 

[Masada]

If A leads to B leads to C and action B does not comply with the rules... ignore action C insofar as it is compatible with B. People will learn quickly

 

[Oruc]

So adding people to friends list? whats it do?

 

[Angst]

Nothing except mind pleasure and socializing.

 

[North King]

What is this? This is madness! This is Facebook!

 

[Kozmos]

They are trying to hunt us down, the people who refuse to make a facebook account. I shall not be castrated with a blunt knife!

 

[Luckymoose]

Hai guiz I wuz wundrn if uz wan b freinds

 

[Angst]

Lucky, I have no idea how you managed it, but you just turned me on from that talk, as I imagined some hot 16-year-old writing it.

Yes, I'm 17, therefore it's ok.

And I can't wait to begin the next update of my NES!

 

[Kraznaya]

Lucky, I have no idea how you managed it, but you just turned me on from that talk, as I imagined some hot 16-year-old writing it.

Yes, I'm 17, therefore it's ok.

And I can't wait to begin the next update of my NES!

That's still vaguely disturbing that you prey upon illiterate teenage girls with the mental age of about 6 and that you managed to imagine LuckyMoose to be one.

 

[Oruc]

That's still vaguely disturbing that you prey upon illiterate teenage girls with the mental age of about 6 and that you managed to imagine LuckyMoose to be one.

He's been coming on to everyone lately, andis, Thalyi, luckymoose err thats it.

 

[bombshoo]

That's still vaguely disturbing that you prey upon illiterate teenage girls with the mental age of about 6 and that you managed to imagine LuckyMoose to be one.

He didn't mention anything about imagining LM being a girl.

 

[Lord_Iggy]

Lucky thought I was crossdressing as a supermodel once...

Back on topic, however, I find the new setup to be a little more cluttered, but I'm sure I'll get used to it in no time.

 

[Frozen In Ice]

CFC seems to be insistant on adding more and more things to the forum pages, and they do seem to be getting a little cluttered, but I actually really like the new layout of the member profiles. It just seems to be more organized.