The People tab describes the leading causes of death inside your nation via a pie chart. The ways people die in your nation can vary from 'Old Age' to 'Lost In Wilderness'. You can affect the leading causes of death just by answering issues, with the answers being a key factor to how people will die. Leading causes of death tend to be random as is impacts of issues.

The Government tab shows the nature of your national expenditure. They are classified under:

• Administration

• Defense

• Education

• Environment

• Healthcare

• Industry

• International Aid

• Law & Order

• Public Transport

• Social Policy

• Spirituality

• and Welfare

It also shows the total expenditure, as well as a percentage of GDP, spent on your nation. Answering issues contribute to the distribution of the money amongst the eleven aspects of the nation and will not spawn any additional category as the categories are fixed.

The Economy tab displays your total GDP and the wages of the Poorest 10% and Richest 10% in your nation. The pie chart shows the nature of industries residing in your nation and is divided into three categories - Government, State-Owned, and Private. Like the People and Government tabs, the nature of your industries are directly affected by your answers for Issues.

Ranks are a very good way of determining how your nation stacks up against the others. In the rank page, your best statistic will be displayed on top while the worst at the bottom. You can toggle the display from actual position to percentile to see how your nation fares both at the regional and world level. You can see your best statistics displayed on your nation page at the very bottom of the description, with your Top 3 just below your Banner.

The trends page is more towards to those who want to keep track of their nation’s progress over time. The default display shows the growth of Political Freedom, Economy and Civil Rights on the graph, with their growth over time being displayed. Specific statistics can also be kept track of and one can switch to a specific stat on the upper right corner of the site when in the Trends page. Hover the mouse over specific parts of the graph to see the actual numerical value.

There are a number of ways that the game uses the term “Influence” to describe a quantity that has an impact on gameplay mechanics. To start, we’ll discuss what influence is from a very technical standpoint--how to get it, and what it’s for--and then we’ll finish up with what the labels you will see in various places mean.

Influence is a statistic that can be viewed on one’s nation page, clicking the TREND icon, and then navigating to “Influence” in the drop-down menu.


Once you load the next page, you’ll find a few pieces of information, including your regional and world ranks. For now, focus on the number called “Soft Power Disbursement Rating”, or SPDR for short. That number represents your earned influence in the game. There’s not a lot you have to do for you to earn influence in the game. You simply have to log in once every seven days. That’s it! Just for doing that you will get one point every 12 hours, at each of the game’s updates. Now, if you join the World Assembly and gain endorsements from your friends, or the leadership of the region, you will gain an additional point at each update for each endorsement. So, if you’re in the WA, and you have five endorsements, you will get five points for those, plus the one for yourself, making a total of 6 points each update. In User Created Regions, this number will only ever increase, but because of changes made to the game, in the Game Created Regions like the Pacific you will be capped at a total of six month’s worth of influence as if you had 10 endorsements. That works out to be 4015 SPDR. In other words, you’ll continue to gain influence until you are at least at that point. Pretty neat! But what’s it used for?

If you become a Delegate or Regional Officer in the game, you can use this to perform various actions—putting a password on a region, or banning and ejecting nations from a region. If you are not Delegate or Regional Officer, you can’t spend Influence. It will cost a Delegate roughly half of your Influence in order to ban and eject you. So, if you have 100 SPDR, a Delegate would have to spend 50 SPDR to ban you from the region. That is the technical side of Influence.

Influence is also referred to in another way. Individual nations have an Influence rank within their region. This simply refers to how much of the total influence that exists in a region is held by that nation. You’ll find the label on your nation page near the top. There are currently 31 ranks. From least to greatest they are:

• Zero,

• Unproven

• Hatchling

• Newcomer

• Nipper

• Minnow

• Sprat

• Shoeshiner

• Page

• Squire

• Apprentice

• Vassal

• Truckler

• Handshaker

• Duckspeaker

• Envoy

• Diplomat

• Ambassador

• Auxiliary

• Negotiator

• Contender

• Instigator

• Dealmaker

• Enforcer

• Eminence Grise

• Powerbroker

• Power

• Superpower

• Dominator

• Hegemony

• and Hermit.

These don’t really mean much, but can be a quick way of seeing how much Influence you have in comparison to others in the region.

One neat feature in NationStates is a badge/achievement system based on your national stats. Each stat is ranked in the region and in the world, with each badge given appropriately based on category. Here is a screenshot of Emperor Emeritus Aleisyr’s badges at the time of writing.

At Label A, you see “Top 1%” and if you look carefully, the first badge has a golden outline. That means that Aleisyr is ranked #1 in the world. What an achievement! The other gold badges, labelled B, mean he is ranked in the top 1% of the world. There are ~170,000 nations as of this writing, which means to earn a Top 1% badge, your nation must be ranked among the first 1,700 nations. These are ranked from highest to lowest. Label C refers to categories that are in the Top 5% of the world. Letter D, likewise, is the Top 10%. There are other badges that can be earned. Letter E shows that Aleisyr purchased the Postmaster General upgrade, and he has also found 8 easter eggs—hidden achievements in the game for performing various actions. Pretty cool! In addition to making your nation page decorative, ranking highly in stats usually help you out in special event games, such as the Challenge Mode listed below.

Ever wished for going to war using your perfectly designed nation? Fortunately, there's a way to do that. Well… kind of.
NationStates introduced a new sub-game on its 10th anniversary, called Challenge (or Challenge Mode). In it, you can pit your nation against others (one at a time) and the game will compare random stats from both (again, one stat per round). The one with the higher stats wins the round. Some stat wins are determined by a hidden number embedded in the game code, in the event of a tie, like Number of Endorsements. The overall winner is the nation winning the majority of rounds.

This section of the Guide endeavours to explain this game.
Let us go about it by getting to know the various characteristics.

Each issue has at least two choices that the leader can choose from, and the amount of choices available varies. Each issue will have a specific problem to be addressed in your nation, and the choices will have solutions presented to the owner of the nation. The owner of the nation may choose any of the choices, or, alternatively, choose to dismiss an issue. Once an option is chosen the issue will be resolved and have immediate effects on a nation.

Once an issue is resolved, a page will be shown with the result of the choice the owner of the nation chooses. Additionally, at the bottom of the page, statistics will be shown regarding changes in nation policy, changes in nation classification, changes in ranks of political freedom, civil rights, and economy, and finally rises and drops in categories such as public transport, where either a positive or negative percentage will be shown to signify drops and rises on the scale.

If a nation meets or exceeds a certain point in a category, a Banner may be given to the nation, which can then be displayed on the nation’s page.
Additionally, if a nation chooses to dismiss an issue, no visible changes will occur in their nation.

Special issues encompass issues that unlock abilities, as well as chain issues.

Special issues are given to nations with an available issue slot when they reach a certain population milestone. Once a nation reaches 250 million, 750 million, or 1 billion citizens, an issue will be given allowing for a capital city to be chosen, a nation leader to be chosen, or for a national religion to be chosen, in that order. If the choice to proceed with instituting these in a nation is chosen, abilities in the settings page will be unlocked enabling the player to edit names.

Chain issues are issues that are given to nations by chance. When such an issue is received, a nation will receive another issue later depending on the choices made on the previous one, relating to the last issue that was decided on. The issue chain will not continue if one of those issues is dismissed.

The telegrams page has different preferences that a user can choose, based on what best suits them. This can be accessed using the Preferences link on the Telegrams page. These customizations include Display Preferences for the telegrams page, Filters for telegrams that will be sent for you, and an Ignore List.

Recruitment telegrams are telegrams sent specifically to try and convince a nation to move to a different region. New nations are flooded with these telegrams, and older nations also receive them periodically. To prevent this, they can be blocked using the Filter on the Telegram Preferences page. Selecting “Block All” under Recruitment will prevent future recruitment telegrams being sent to your nation.

The NationStates Store page allows users to purchase upgrades to their Inboxes. Upgrades include new features such as a Deleted Telegrams folder, the ability to hold up to an unlimited amount of telegrams, the ability to create new folders, and telegram stamps. Telegram stamps allow a user to send mass telegrams to nations.

Every region has a Regional Message Board, which is viewable when scrolled to the bottom of the region page. It can also be seen in a forum view format, where only messages are viewable and you can click through pages, instead of clicking the option to see older messages on the region page. When composing a message, BBCode such as bolding text, italicizing text, underlining text, tagging nations, and tagging regions is available. NationStates allows you to both Like and quote previous messages, and Officers with Communications authority as well as NationStates moderators can suppress messages. After posting a message, users have the option of deleting a message or editing a message.

NationStates is a nation simulation game and hence, it is obvious that we would have Roleplay (RP) here. The Pacific has two platforms for RP: the offsite forums, and the Regional Message Board (RMB). Let's look at the RMB Roleplay.

By now you ought to have an excellent grasp on Stats. If not, read the relevant sections of this guide first.

The RMB RP is based on your nation's Stats and Policies (more on Policies further down). On top of this, you can add your lore, unique characteristics, governments, technologies, or animals. The RP is based in the current era, and nations generally have the equivalent of Modern-Tech. This may vary based on individual stats, but you get the idea.

Like all systems, the RP has simple rules that need to be followed to better RP with others and hence have the most fun. Read the RMB RP Guidebook, which contains our rules, and explanations on using stats. You can find it anytime on our region's home page.

Passive RP (guidebook terminology) is more dominant on the RMB, usually with multiple plots existing simultaneously. You can also have a solo-RP with your own fictional elements, or you can join an ongoing plot with permission from its players or by contacting the Overseer, who'll then arrange it for you.

Have a look in the RMB to get an idea about how the roleplay is done. Note that there is no set approach to RP and you are free to come up with your own methods. Everyone has their own style and you don't have to copy anyone. That said, our RMB is one of the friendliest places in NS and have no inhibitions in posting there and asking for help.

Administration can be viewed by all nations, if in a more limited sense than one with permissions can access. The different permissions that enable a player to edit the region page are designated by the site. Three types of regional positions can use the Administration page. In a Game Created Region (GCR), only the World Assembly Delegate (WAD) or a Regional Officer (RO) can utilize the page. In a User Created Region (UCR), a Founder has absolute control over the region and does not require any permissions on what they can do with the region so long as the UCR was created with an Executive Founder.

This is a short guide on how to navigate and operate the Administration page of your region.

Region Page:

To access administration, click the admin icon.

Regional Officers:

“I want officers!”

To appoint a Regional Officer (RO), click “Appoint New Officer.” From there, click on “Select a Nation.” There are the standard offices with set abilities to choose from. One may also choose the Custom field, which will result in this:

“I chose custom. Now what?”

First, name the Office in the first field. In the second field, select whichever controls you wish for your Regional Officer to possess.

• “Appearance” allows your selected RO to edit the flag, content, and superficial aspects of the administration panel.

• “Border Control” allows for banning or banjecting nations in the region. If you are a WA Delegate rather than a Founder, you must have held the position for 26 hours to appoint an Officer with Border Control. You may appoint one nation for every 26 hours you have been a Delegate.

• “Communications” pertains to Telegrams, which can be regional or recruitment and can suppress Regional Message Board posts.

• “Embassies” allows the RO to allow embassy posting, accept new embassies, or propose new embassies.

• Lastly, “Polls” allows the RO to make polls for the region.

Appearance

“So I see a text box now. What’s up with that?”

The World Factbook Entry (WFE) is the regional information page. On the WFE, information about the region is typically input by the Delegate, Founder, or a RO. Founders who do not wish to allow changes to the WFE by other individuals can take away executive Delegate authority and/or remove Appearance from the abilities of existing RO. Code is allowed, images are not enabled, and there is no limit to the number of changes one wishes to enact in any given time span. The code enabled is BBcode. The guide applying to that can be found here: [insert link]

“I want a new flag”

A flag is uploaded from a computer or phone and is resized to fit the site requirements automatically. All flags are subject to the site rules—no images with illegal content are permitted. Anyone with Appearance permissions can change the flag.

“What about Dispatches?”

Dispatches are either custom written for the region or imported from existing Dispatches or Factbooks. More information on Dispatches may be found here. Click on the following to access options for a Dispatch:

“What on earth is a tag?”

Tags are used to identify the region’s attributes. You may add or remove as many as you wish. They are added manually, one-by-one. They are removed also in that manner. The ability to change tags is granted to anyone with Appearance controls. Keep in mind that when you are recruiting, you may not recruit from a region without the “Recruiter Friendly” tag.

(As a warning, having the Fascist tag is guaranteed to result in a raid at some point.)

Embassies:

Embassies are controlled by those with Embassy permissions. They are usually indicative of relations with another region. One can request an Embassy by visiting the administration page of another region, or by accepting an invitation which can be found in your regional controls. Some people enjoy collecting embassies, others only accept embassies from allies.

Communications:

Yes, there are a number of controls for Telegrams (TGs). There are the custom settings for the region (setting a regional welcome TG), and settings to send out manual recruitment TGs (these are only really employed by UCRs, but can be used by GCRs who believe recruitment is necessary). Controls can be edited to send TGs to newly founded nations, nations who leave the region, all nations within the region. TGs which intend recruitment must be marked as such, or there will be modly action.

Border Control:

Border Control settings belong exclusively to a Founder, an Executive World Assembly Delegate, and any Regional Officer with the appropriate permissions. A Founder has unlimited controls which do not require influence to utilize. However, any other position wishing to use Border Controls is required to have sufficient influence. To find more information on influence calculation, see this guide: [insert link].

“I want a password!”

Passwords prevent nations from entering, particularly those without visible passwords. A visible password is possible to leak due to the fact that any nation in the region can see it. Founders do not require influence to set a password. All other positions do.

“So, I want to ban this guy…”

Again, influence is necessary in all cases except that of the Founder. Any nation, including yourself, may be banned. You can choose to ban in other locations, but the Administration page is also sufficient, as it enables you to estimate how much influence it will cost you to ban a problematic nation.

Polls:

To set up a poll, one merely clicks on the “New Poll” option. The result should appear as such:

The technical name for formatting codes on NationStates is NSCode, but most of you will be more familiar with the term BBCode. There are several places where such code can be used, and each example will be followed by D for Dispatch, T for Telegrams, R for RMB, W for WFEs, and P for WA Proposals. If a code can be used in every location, it will be denoted by E. All tags will be in square brackets [ ] and will need both an open bracket [ ] and a close bracket [/]. In addition, you can stack multiple tags on the same piece of text, but be sure to close them in the reverse order of which they were opened. In other words, if you used the bold tag, then the italics tag, you’d close the italics tag, then close the bold tag.

Text Formatting Codes (E):
You can make your text bold by surrounding the text with the b tag.
This text is Bold.
You can make your text italicized with the i tag.
This text is Italicized!
You can underline your text with the u tag.
This text is underlined
You can strike out text with the strike tag.
This text shows a strike out.
You can use superscripts and subscripts with the sup and sub tags, respectively.
Here is a ^Superscript and here is a _subscript example.

If you want to show someone an example of your code, but do not want it to automatically turn into formatted text, you can use the pre tag (E).

This text will not format even if I use [b]bold[/b], [i]italics[/i] or [u]any[/u] other tags.

Useful NS Codes (E):
You can refer to Nations and Regions by using the nation and region tags.
The nation tag has 3 variants: nation, nation=short, and nation=noflag, and the latter two are able to be combined into nation=short+noflag. Nation will include the pre-title of a nation, short will just include the nation name and noflag will remove the little flag icon from the mention. An even faster way to get the nation tag is to use @nationname, and the game will automatically create the tag for you.
East Durthang or East Durthang or East Durthang and finally East Durthang.
You can link to a region by enclosing the region name with the region tag: The Pacific is the best region in the game.
There are two WA related tags, proposal and resolution, that can help you campaign for, or discuss things related to the WA. You can use these tags everywhere. To use [proposal, you’ll need the proposal ID. It looks like this: [proposal=ProposalID]Here is a proposal[/proposal].
To use the resolution tag, you’ll need the the Council ID (GA, SC, or UN) and Resolution ID (#X) which looks like this: Some Text Here.

Sometimes you want to hide your content to save space. In that event, you can use the Spoiler tag (E). You can either go with the default tag,

You can also use links with the url tag. There are Internal links (E) and External links (D, W). To use this, you put your Link text here. If the link is internal, you can omit the tag altogether and it will format for you.

You can also use NSCode to make bulleted lists (E). The tags are list and *. Using the list tag will also let you set what kind of bullets you’d like to use. Left empty, your bullets will be standard, but the other options are 1, a, i, A, I. This will create lists with numbers, lowercase letters, lowercase roman numerals, uppercase letters, and uppercase roman numerals, respectively. The * tag is used for each item in the list. In addition, you can nest a list within a list to switch which kind of bullet you are using.

Some places allow the use of color (D, W). The color tag (also works with colour) can take both names of colors and hexadecimal color codes. Red text or Orange text.

In the RMB, you can use the quote tag without using the quote button, but you’ll need the author and post ID to do this. [quote=nationname;postID]Here is some text that I said.[/quote].

The rest of the codes only apply to dispatches. You can highlight some text by using the background and background-block. Again, you can choose the color by name or hexadecimal. Use background for a single line or a few words, and use background-block for longer sections of text consisting of multiple lines.

You might also want to change the font itself, in which case you’ll want the font tag. You can specify which font you want, or multiple in the event your font does not display on someone else’s screen--just separate them by commas and put them in order of preference. This is courier font.

You can align your text with the align or center/centre tags. The options for the align tag are left, right, center, and justify.

If you want to put an image in your dispatch, you can do so with the img tag. [img]url.jpg[/img].

You can float images or text with the float tag. This lets you, for example, surround text by images on both sides.

You can also make nice looking boxes with the box tag. These cannot be nested to make a box within a box. You can, however, use a sidebar tag to create a second box that will float on the right side of the page.

You can indent your text with the tab tag, and the number of pixels you would like to indent said text. This text is indented.

You can create anchors in your dispatch so that you can link to specific parts of the dispatch. You create the anchor by using the set, and then you can link to that spot with the url tag, substituting #NAMEOFANCHOR where the URL went previously: Go here!.

Finally, there are tables available in dispatches. You use the table tag to open a table, a tr tag to create a row, and then td tags within tr tags to create the cells. You can choose to have borders or get rid of them by using

Be careful to make sure you put the same number of td tags inside each set of tr tags.

That’s all there is to know about NSCode, but if you need a more in-depth, visual version of this, there’s an excellent dispatch.

While you may only have one nation in the World Assembly at some time, acquiring WA membership is easy. You will need to link your nation to an email. Then, simply go to the WA page and click apply. After receiving the verification email, click the link, and you will be a WA member. The game has a number of sophisticated checks to determine whether someone has multiple World Assembly nations. The administration team is very wary of releasing information on those checks, but all indications show they are reasonably effective.

Endorsing a nation is quite simple. If you are a WA member, simply go to the page showing the nation you want to endorse, scroll to the bottom, and click the button saying 'Endorse'.
To protect our nation from invaders, the Pacific mandates that you endorse our emperor: East Durthang and if you wish: Xoriet, Jar wattinree, Samasbhi and The Seeker of Power. Two of our regional officers use their WA account in our military so may or may not be a member of the WA. They are: Marinas island and Shnailand you can endorse them if they are currently in the WA on their main nations.

To safeguard our region, nations can have no more than 10 endorsements. Exarchate can have 25 and Senators can have 100. If you get pushed over the endorsement cap—don’t worry, you won’t get punished, but ask them to unendorse you, and if they still haven’t the PG will deal with it. Remember you are not allowed to actively ask for endorsements, as this could get you banned from the region

From time to time, the World Assembly will have votes. There, there are two classes of voters: Delegates and nations. Delegates receive a number of votes equal to the number of endorsements they have, plus one, for their own nation. Nations all receive one vote. These votes are cast in World Assembly page. There are two chambers, the General Assembly and Security Council, both of which these votes are applicable in. Delegates also serve a secondary function in determining whether or not a proposal can reach the general voting populace. This is a screening function, requiring that legislation gain approval from 6% of Delegates before coming to a general vote. As of this writing, out of 1,368 Delegates, 6% means 83.

The General Assembly is the world's legislative body. There, international legislation is debated and voted upon. The Assembly has passed legislation on many different topics, ranging from prohibitions on slavery, protections for humanitarian aid workers, rights for the people to petition the government and express themselves, to protecting the environment.

The Security Council is a body with three powers: Commend, Condemn, and Liberation. Commend and Condemn are resolutions which give nations or regions badges. Generally, people consider these to be rewards for playing the game well in a good or evil manner. Thus, prominent raiders are rewarded for their skill with Condemn badges. And people like GA resolution authors or defenders are rewarded for their skill writing resolutions with Commend badges. Liberations strike down delegate imposed passwords. It does not affect Founder-imposed passwords. And it is generally used to aid in the liberation of regions which have imposed passwords.

The General Assembly has a relatively complicated ruleset, which has a number of requirements. You can read it here., The people in charge of determining whether something meets the requirements of that ruleset are the members of the GA Secretariat, also known as GenSec. Some of the more complicated of these rules are the Category and Originality rules. The Category rule requires that the text of some proposal match the description of the category under which it is submitted. Thus, a proposal dealing with food waste cannot be classified under Human Rights, which is described as 'A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights'. The Originality rules are two-fold. But in summary, a proposal cannot violate or duplicate the provisions of another one. For example, as the World Assembly has legislation banning slavery, there is no need to ban slavery once again. The Security Council is more simple and has four rules. They are prohibitions on commending or condemning staff members, plagiarism and duplication, a requirement that there be an operative clause and a requirement that texts be written so to represent the opinion of the World Assembly. If you have a proposal that you want to send before either chamber, it is recommended that you post that proposal to that chamber's forum for comment. Proposals can be submitted without such comment, but due to the many intricacies of the ruleset, it can be hard to figure all of these out without assistance. However for both chambers, after submission, a proposal must gain approvals from delegates before it can be voted upon. There is a few-days-long limit on how long proposals remain up for approvals. As nowhere near six per cent of delegates regularly check the queue (and fewer still will approve), you must campaign for your proposal.

There are three ways to campaign for a proposal. The first is manual campaigning, which is effectively the same as sending a telegram one after another for hours. Unless you do not value your time, this is infeasible. The second method is to use stamps. This is relatively cheap but requires that you have a non-zero amount of money to spend. The third is to use the API. That is probably too technical for this, but you may want to refer to this guide After writing a telegram politely asking delegates to approve your proposal, it will take around a day or two until it gains the necessary number of approvals. When the floor is empty and your proposal is the first proposal in the queue that meets quorum, it will be promoted to the floor and the vote will begin.

You can read more about it here.

Single player mechanics
1. My telegrams are being bombarded. How the f*ck do I stop this spam?
2. What are issues?
3. What are civil rights, economy and political freedom? Isn't 'political freedom' an oxymoron?
4. What are policies? And lul wut since when did I legalise polygamy?
5. What are the 'people', 'government' and 'economy' statistics?
6. What are ranks? Is this just more statistics?

Multiplayer mechanics
1. What are regions?

Welcome to NationStates! In the course of recruiting people who are new to the game in our region, we get a lot of questions back from them about NationStates, regions, and just how to get started and what to do. In the hopes of helping other players that are new to the game, we've comprised this list of frequently asked questions along with their answers. We hope that this helps you understand some of the basic aspects of the game so you can get a better start!

If you have a NationStates question that is not answered here, feel free to send me a telegram and I'll be happy to help you out individually as well.

As an example of what a region can offer its members, check out Wintreath's region guide here!

Please be aware that while you can have multiple nations in the game, according to game rules you may only have ONE nation in the World Assembly at any one time. It's recommended that you use the same email when creating all of your nations, so that you will receive a warning if you attempt to join the World Assembly on one nation while you are already in it on another.

Because the delegate of a region may have such powers over them, many regions have controls in place to ensure that the delegate selected by their own customs remains the delegate. Please be sure to read any rules or laws on endorsing other nations in your region (these can usually be found in the World Factbook Entry at the top of its region page).

NationStates was created in 2002 by Max Barry to promote his novel, Jennifer Government. Since then, the game has grown into a community of with thousands of individual players from around the world.

When your nation is created, your nation will start out in a Game Created Region (GCR) known as a “Feeder region”, one of five Regions where new nations are born.

The Feeder regions are:

The West Pacific
The Pacific
The East Pacific
The North Pacific
The South Pacific


Other types of Game Created regions include the three "Sinker" regions where nations that have ceased to exist (CTE'd) are 'refounded':

Lazarus
Osiris
Balder

The region where all ejected and banned nations go:

The Rejected Realms

And the Warzone regions:

Warzone Sandbox
Warzone Europe
Warzone Asia
Warzone Africa
Warzone Australia


All other regions are 'founded' by players and are known as 'User Created Regions' (UCRs). Any player can create his or her own region(s).

So, now what?

After your nation is created, it's all up to you, the player.

How can I stop all these recruitment telegrams?

You can adjust your Telegram Inbox preferences here.

What are some of your options ?

- You can stay in the Feeder region in which your nation is created, or you can move your nation to a different region.
   (note: Some User Created Regions are password protected)

- You can create your own region via the Found Region page.

- You can make decisions on 'Issues' your nation receives. Making decisions on issues is what alters your nation's economy, civil rights, and politics, and many other national statistics.
   Fair warning: NationStates issues tend to be humorous, satirical, and sometimes just plain bizarre. Just as in RL, there can be unintended consequences. Don't take NS too seriously. ;)

- You can alter your nation's flag and it's motto, as well as it's currency and national animal.
   More options will become available to your nation over time:

-===>Capital City: Unlockable with 250 million citizens. #241: A Capital City For @@NAME@@?
-===>Leader: Unlockable with 750 million citizens. #242: Follow The Leader
-===>National Religion: Unlockable with 1 billion citizen #243: A Question Of Faith

- You can write Factbook entries and Dispatches for your nation.

- You can participate in the discussion on the Regional Message Board (RMB).

- You can telegram other nations.

- You can apply to join the World Assembly.

About the joining World Assembly: Please be aware that while a player may have more than one nation, a player may only have one nation as a member of the World Assembly at any time. Trying to violate this game rule can get your nation deleted. (Or worse, some Moderators are said to have bad breath.)

- Once you've joined the World Assembly, you can vote on General Assembly and Security Council Resolutions, as well as give and receive Endorsements.

- Once you have received two endorsements, you can submit your own World Assembly Resolutions.

- We recommend you bring Resolution proposals up for discussion on the in-game forum before submitting it. There are many helpful players to assist in getting the proposal ready for submission.

Anything Else to do?

Oh yes, it all depends upon what interests you.
- For example, you can join off-site regional forums[/url]. This is where regional governance and events take place. Many regions, both GCR's and UCR's also maintain their own off-site forums, separate from the NationStates forum.

- Speaking of the NationStates forum, you'll find technical assistance for the game there, Roleplay's, World Assembly Debates and more there.

- Join a Government. Many, if not most regions, have some form of Regional Government. Most regions would be happy to have more people participate in these.

- Join a Roleplay. In addition to the RP hosted on the NationStates forum, many regions have their own RP communities.

How do I go to war?

- NationStates does not provide a warfare system, however players do engage in 'military' gameplay operations that generally employ the use of World Assembly endorsements to control a region's Delegacy. This is often known as Raiding and Defending (R/D gameplay.) Speak with a region's military leader for more info, most would be happy to train you.

- You might want to read this Complete Guide to Military Gameplay pinned in the NS Gameplay forum.

- Oh wait, you meant Roleplay war? See the NationStates National and International Roleplaying forum, or the offsite forum of a region that hosts Roleplay.

How can I increase my population more quickly?

- In short, you can't. Population growth is a set game mechanic that cannot be controlled by the player. Every day your nation exists, it will grow a few million in population. Of course, if your nation ceases to exist (CTE), it will no longer gain in population until you restore your nation.

How do I win the game?

- Sorry, there are no 'win conditions' line or 'end game' to NationStates, the game is not played on that basis. Although you can compete with other nations to see where your nation ranks in the lastest NationStates Census. Your answers to issues will alter where your nation stands in the rankings. Some regional player communities also hold their own contests and issue graphic awards for winning them.

- However, there are a couple 'mini games' that were created for April Fool's days past (the annual prank/treat is a tradition in NS), There is the Challenge Game, and Cards Against NationStates.

Anything else I should know?

Well, probably more that I think to write here. But you might keep in mind:
- A reminder again....Don’t join the World Assembly with more than one nation. (we don't want your nation to get deleted)

- Do not flame, troll, post racist statements. But really, using common courtesy will keep you safe and respected. Give respect and it will be given to you.

- Your nation will automatically 'Cease to Exist' (CTE) if you haven’t logged in for 28 days. Although you can set your nation to “Vacation Mode” to extend that to 60 days.

- In the event that your nation has CTE'd, you can restore it by simply logging in. You’ll find your nation restored in one of the Game Created 'Sinker' regions :Lazarus, Osiris, or Balder.

Most importantly, have fun and enjoy the game!

Autocracy - The nation does not hold democratic elections.

Theocracy - Worship of the official state religion is mandatory.

Monarchy - The special status of a royal family is enshrined in law.

Feudalism - The nation practices a feudal system of lords and serfs.

Devolution - Government power is substantially delegated to local authorities.

State Press - Only state-controlled media is permitted.

Public Protest - The right to unfettered public protest is enshrined in law.

No Dissent - Public protests are illegal.

Sortition - Parliamentarians are randomly selected.

Pledge of Allegiance - The daily singing of an anthem or reciting of a pledge is compulsory in schools.

Proportional Representation - Votes translate linearly to elected representation, with no seats or electoral college.

Native Representation - Only native-born citizens may hold elected office.

Term Limits - Elected representatives must leave office after a legally mandated amount of time.

Marriage Equality - Citizens of the same sex may marry.

No Marriage - Marriage is prohibited.

Permanent Marriage - Divorce is illegal.

Heterosexuality - Same-sex relationships are illegal.

Polygamy - Citizens may have multiple spouses.

No Adultery - Adultery is prohibited by law.

Atheism - Religious worship is prohibited.

No Contraception - Contraception is illegal.

No Abortion - Abortion is illegal.

Geronticide - Citizens are not permitted to reach old age.

Euthanasia - Citizens are legally entitled to end their lives.

Compulsory Organ Harvesting - Citizens have no say in the medical use of their bodies after death.

Vat-Produced Infants - Biological reproduction is prohibited.

AI Personhood - Artificial beings are legally recognized citizens.

Vegetarianism - Vegetarianism is compulsory.

Parental Licensing - Citizens must acquire a license in order to have children.

Child Self-Rearing - Children are left in the wilderness to raise themselves.

Cannibalism - Consuming the flesh of fellow humans is legal.

Body Integrity - Citizens may not pierce their bodies nor circumcize their children.

Prudism - Strict modesty laws govern how citizens may dress.

Nudism - Clothing is forbidden.

No Sports - Physical contact sports are prohibited.

Sex Education - School-age children receive mandatory sex education.

No Smoking - Smoking is prohibited, even in private.

No Zoos - Animals may not be kept in confinement.

Capital Punishment - Citizens may be executed for crimes.

Corporal Punishment - Criminals may be ordered to undergo physical punishment.

Human Sacrifice - Religious sacrifice of human beings is legal.

Conscription - A period of military service is compulsory for all citizens.

No Judiciary - The nation has abolished the court system.

Gun Control - Citizens are forbidden from owning firearms.

Gun Ownership - All citizens are required to own a firearm.

Curfew - The nation enforces a national curfew.

No Prison - Jails and prisons are not employed.

State Surveillance - The state heavily monitors citizen behavior and communication.

DNA Harvesting - Citizen DNA must be submitted to the state.

ID Chips - Citizens are administered an under-the-skin ID chip.

Socialism - Industry is owned and run by the government in a centrally planned economy.

Capitalism - Private industry is permitted within a market-based economy.

AI Planning - The nation runs an AI-backed planned economy.

Child Labor - Children may be legally employed as workers and contractors.

Maternity Leave - Mothers of newborn children received paid leave from employment.

No Computers - Computers are banned.

Universal Health Care - The state provides health care to all citizens.

No Internet - Citizens may not connect to the Internet.

Cannabis - Cannabis may be legally purchased.

No Drugs - All recreational drugs are prohibited.

No Automobiles - Cars are banned.

Slavery - Slavery is legal

Prohibition - Alcohol is banned.

Autarky - The nation pursues a policy of economic self-sufficiency.

Affirmative Action - Organizations are required to meet demographic quotas.

No Gambling - Gambling is illegal.

No Video Games - Computer games are banned.

No Nuclear Power - Nuclear power generation is prohibited.

Nuclear Power - The nation is nuclear powered.

Space Program - The nation runs a space program.

No Aircraft - Aircraft are banned.

Metricism - The state mandates the use of the metric system.

Weapons of Mass Destruction - The nation claims the legal right to use WMDs.

No WMDs - The nation opposes the use of WMDs.

Climate Treaty - The nation is a signatory to an international climate treaty.

No Immigration - Foreigners cannot become residents.

No Emigration - Citizens are not permitted to leave.

Regional Influence is an automatically-generated measure of how powerful your nation is in your region. It is only relevant in a gameplay sense, and has no impact on roleplay. Influence was created in 2006 in response to the ability of players to eject large numbers of other nations and password regions unchecked. These actions contributed to the total destruction of many regions, an act known as "griefing." Influence, at its core, is designed to protect regions from this fate.

2. How do I get influence?

Influence is gained by every nation at every update, provided that nation has logged in at least once in the last week. If the nation is more than one week inactive, influence remains constant. For most nations, influence increases at a rate of one Soft Power Disbursement Rating (SPDR) point per update. For a WA nation, the influence gain is one plus its endorsement count, every update. For example, a WA nation with three endorsements would gain eight influence points per day, whereas a non-WA nation or a WA nation with no endorsements would gain only two influence points per day.

3. What can I use influence for?

Influence can be used to eject and ban nations or password regions. A nation's influence also protects it (to an extent) from ejection or banning by a delegate or Regional Officer. There are no other uses for influence.

4. Who can use influence?

Delegates and Regional Officers with Border Control authority can use influence. It costs a delegate one half of the target nation's influence to eject and ban them, and one third of the target nation's influence to simply eject them. The cost for Regional Officers is twice as high as the cost for delegates, so it costs a BC-enabled Regional Officer all of the target nation's influence to eject and ban them, and two thirds to simply eject them.

Nations with Border Control authority can also use influence to password regions. To set a visible password, a delegate or Regional Officer must spend 20 points per nation in the region, with a minimum of 200 points. To set an invisible password, the cost is 40 points per nation in the region, with a minimum of 400 points. Removing a password requires no influence.

Founders can eject, ban, and password at no cost to their influence.

I thought I had enough influence to eject/ban/password, but I ran out! Why? Skip to #11 for a possible explanation.

5. What do the ratings mean?

The ratings are as follows, from lowest to highest.

These are a measure of relative influence. In other words, they show how much influence you have compared to the total influence present in the region. A nation residing in a very small region might have very little influence, but have a high rating. Conversely, a nation residing in an extremely large region might have a great deal of influence, but have a very low rating, because they have a very small portion of the overall influence pie.

Before a region passes its first major update, all resident nations will be displayed as Hermits.

6. How much influence do I have?

The easiest way to check your absolute (non-relative) influence value is to go to your Rank page and click on the link for Influence. This number represents the exact amount of influence you have in all regions combined. It is possible to have influence in multiple regions at once, but generally speaking, the vast majority or all of your influence will be from one region.

7. What is Regional Power?

A region's Regional Power rating is a measure of the total influence present in the region, relative to the sum of all influence in the world (496M points as of July 22, 2021). The ratings, along with percentages of the world's influence and an estimation of their absolute influence values, are as follows.

0% to 0.01% (roughly 0 to 50k points): Low
0.01% to 0.05% (roughly 50k to 250k points): Moderate
0.05% to 0.2% (roughly 250k to 1M points): High
0.2% to 1% (roughly 1M to 5M points): Very High
1% and up (roughly 5M points or more): Extremely High

Regional Power is not displayed in regions with a Low rating.

It usually takes many years to achieve a rating of Extremely High, and only a small number of regions have ever reached that point, including some of the game-created Feeder and Sinker regions. As time passes and the cumulative value of the world's influence increases, achieving higher Regional Power ratings grows more difficult, and some regions fall to lower ratings. Over the course of 2020 alone, the nominal threshold for Very High increased by 200k points, or 28%.

8. How much influence does my region have?

The easiest way to determine a region's absolute influence is by going to any nation's Influence census page, clicking the "Other" link at the bottom, and adding the region to the chart. This will tell you the average influence of all its nations. Multiply that number by the region's population to find the total influence. The population number used for this calculation must be the nation count at 0335 EST / EDT. When finding total influence retroactively, population numbers on regional History pages can be used.

On rare occasions, there will be a region with more influence than its Regional Power rating would suggest. This happens when high-influence nations move in from other regions and bring up the average. A region's Regional Power rating only takes into account influence from that particular region. However, the average influence number includes any influence left over from resident's past regions. The effect of this is usually negligible.

9. Can I use my influence in other regions?

No, your influence in one region cannot be used to eject, ban, or password in another region. However, there is some amount of carry-over. If you have influence in one region, then move to another permanently, you will have more influence in the second region than you would had you started from scratch. This is especially the case if you have more endorsements in the new region than you did in the old one (ie, your influence gain is higher than it was).

10. Why am I losing influence?

There are four possible reasons for this:

a) You ceased to exist. Nations deleted for inactivity immediately begin to lose influence rapidly (though not as fast as nations that leave their regions). Additionally, when a nation ceases to exist, all influence it holds from other regions is instantly erased. Thus, if a high-influence nation is ejected from Region A, ceases to exist in The Rejected Realms, and is revived the next day, it will have no influence left from Region A.

b) You left your region for at least one update. Leaving a region briefly does not cost you influence, but if you leave the region when it updates, you begin to lose influence. If you are gone for a long time, you will probably lose all your influence in that region. Influence decay following a permanent move is calculated as follows: four points lost after the first day (two updates), nine points after the second day, and fourteen after the third. From then on, the day-to-day loss increases by eight points per day. For example, a nation that left its region two weeks ago will have lost 705 points, provided it had that much to begin with. Meanwhile, it will have begun to accumulate influence in its new region.

c) You are in a Feeder or Sinker. These include the five Pacifics, Lazarus, Osiris, Balder, and The Rejected Realms. Influence in these regions expires after roughly six months, so after spending half a year there, your influence may flatline. If you have more endorsements than you did when you arrived, it may continue to increase for a while. If you have fewer endorsements, your influence will begin to fall. The exact formula for influence decay in feeders and sinkers is unknown.

The influence of a nation residing in a feeder or sinker will not decay below 4015 points, which is the influence accumulated in half a year by a nation with ten endorsements. A nation with ten endorsements or fewer may accumulate this much influence before plateauing.

d) You spent influence without realizing it. If you are a delegate or Regional Officer and you ejected or banned a nation by accident (or on purpose), it cost you influence. The cost does not show up until after the next update.

11. Why did my influence change between updates? or, Why did I run out of influence for Border Control actions?

Both of these phenomena are due to the "influence advance." The amount of influence displayed for a nation after it updates is actually the amount of influence it will have after the next update, provided nothing changes before then. In other words, a nation's true influence level is the displayed value, minus its endorsement count, minus one. If that nation's endorsement count increases before its next update, its displayed influence will as well. Conversely, if the endorsement count drops, or the nation resigns from the WA and resets its count to zero, it will lose as many influence points as it had endorsements. A nation's influence level at one update is not "locked in" until after the next update.

For most players, the influence advance is inconsequential. However, it can have serious effects for regional officials and military gameplayers. If a twenty-endorsement delegate has an influence score of 100 and wants to eject a nation with a score of 300, they should be able to do so. Once the influence advance is taken into account, that delegate's true influence score is only 79, and they will not be able to eject any nation with a score of over 237.

Return to top

I [b]really[/b] like text that [i]makes a point[/i], you [u]know[/u]?

I [strike]like[/strike] [sub]love[/sub] love [sup]love[/sup] this region!

I am [nation]Testlandia[/nation]. Or, to use my full name, [nation=long]Testlandia[/nation]. If you prefer to omit flags, you can call me [nation=noflag]Testlandia[/nation] or [nation=long+noflag]Testlandia[/nation]. In dispatches (only), I can be a mere flag: [nation=noname]Testlandia[/nation]

(Tip: When writing a post or dispatch, hit "@" and begin typing a nation name for an auto-completing shortcut.)

[region]The Pacific[/region] was the very first region in the world.

(Tip: When writing a post or dispatch, hit "@" and begin typing a region name for an auto-completing shortcut.)

Please support [proposal=separatist_peoples_1416233457]my proposal[/proposal]!

The foundation of modern WA legislation is [resolution=galegacy#2]the Rights and Duties law[/resolution].

[spoiler]Surprise![/spoiler]

[spoiler=Try this one, too!]Boo!![/spoiler]

Did you know the guy who wrote NationStates is [url=http://maxbarry.com]Max Barry[/url]?

A lot of people live in [url=http://forum.nationstates.net/]the forums[/url]!

You can actually omit the [url] tag for full URLs, like this: http://www.nationstates.net/page=faq

But it's usually most helpful to provide descriptive text, so people know [url=http://www.nationstates.net/page=faq]this link leads to the FAQ[/url].

[list][*]One
[*]Two
[*]Three[/list]

• One

• Two

• Three

[list=1][*]A more complicated list, which contains a nested list:
[list=i][*]"1" is 1, 2, 3...
[*]"i" is i, ii, iii...
[*]"a" is a, b, c...[/list]
[*]And the above can be capitalized, for A, B, C... and I, II, III...[/list]

1. A more complicated list, which contains a nested list:

   1. "1" is 1, 2, 3...

   2. "i" is i, ii, iii...

   3. "a" is a, b, c...

2. And the above can be capitalized, for A, B, C... and I, II, III...

[pre]You bold like [b]this[/b]![/pre]

You bold like [b]this[/b]!

Sometimes you want [size=150]big text[/size] but other times only [size=90]small text[/size] will do.

I [color=red]love[/color] a little [colour=#FF9900]color[/colour].

[quote=testlandia;4970610]It's an outrage![/quote]

Testlandia wrote:

It's an outrage!

Backgrounds can be applied to [background=yellow]highlight a few words[/background].

[background-block=yellow]Backgrounds can also be applied at the paragraph level, which is especially noticeable...

...when it flows over multiple lines.[/background-block]

[font=Courier]What a beautiful font![/font]

[font=Times New Roman, Arial, sans]What a beautiful font![/font]

[align=center]Centered text.[/align]

[align=right]Right-justified text.[/align]

[centre]This is also centred, especially if you're British.[/centre]

[img]http://www.nationstates.net/images/foot_jg.png[/img]

You can also set some visual options:

[img view="shadow"]https://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/Switzerland.png[/img]

[img view="standout"]https://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/Switzerland.png[/img]

[img view="standout border shadow"]https://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/Switzerland.png[/img]

[float=right][img]http://www.nationstates.net/images/foot_jg.png[/img][/float]
[float=left][img]http://www.nationstates.net/images/foot_jg.png[/img][/float]
Images float on either side of this text.

[box]A pretty box.[/box]

[sidebar]Sidebars are very similar to box + float-right, but don't stretch across the whole screen (except on mobile devices).[/sidebar]

[tab=100]Some indented text[/tab].

[anchor=JUMPHERE][/anchor]Useful for tables of contents.
Jump to [url=#JUMPHERE]my anchor[/url].

[table][tr][td]A table's first row looks different[/td][td]Next cell[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Second row[/td][td]Next cell[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Third row[/td][td]Next cell[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Fourth row, which goes on at some length about nothing. It also has a line break in it. Here it comes. Ready? Okay!! Here it is!!
See?[/td][td]Next cell[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Hovering over a row highlights it[/td][td]Not bad, eh?[/td][/tr]
[/table]

[float=right][table=plain]
[tr][td]Table type:[/td][td]Plain[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Decoration:[/td][td]None[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Excitement level:[/td][td]Low[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Usefulness for formatting:[/td][td]High[/td][/tr]
[/table][/float]

★ ★

Bold makes words [b]thick[/b].

★ ★

Underline draws lines [u]under[/u] text.

★ ★

Italics makes words [i]slant[/i].

☆ ★

Strikethrough puts a line [strike]through[/strike] the text.

☆ ★

Color can make words [color=#5555BB]pretty[/color]!

★ ★

Nations can be linked fully and simply by saying [nation=aramonda]

★ ★

You can also link nations with their flag and short name by saying \@aramonda

If you want to still display the @ sign, you can use \@aramonda. To display \@aramonda, you have to type \\@aramonda.

You can also link them in tags with special modifiers. There is short, noflag, and noname, which can be combined with a + sign. (Short, noname, and @aramonda all do the same thing for some reason)

★ ★

If you want the nation name to be regular, you can say [nation]aramonda[/nation]

★ ★

If you want the nation name to be short, you can say [nation=short]aramonda[/nation]

★ ★

If you want the nation name have no flag, you can say [nation=noflag]aramonda[/nation]

★ ★

If you want the nation name to have no name, you can say [nation=noname]aramonda[/nation]

★ ★

If you want, you can combine them to make [nation=short+noflag]aramonda[/nation]

★ ★

The region tag only displays when you do it like [region]United Nations of Blockland[/region]

Lists are used to display a list of elements in a vertically-assorted, equally-indented catalogue that carries a symbol before it that indicates the part of a whole.

Simple bulleted lists are done like this:

[list]
[*]Element 1
[*]Element 2
[/list]

They can also be done with no spaces like this:

[list][*]Element 1[*]Element 2[/list]

Both methods result in this:

• Element 1

• Element 2
  

With the listed elements by each individual point will continue until the list ends or another

[*]

You can also put lists inside of lists for organizing purposes, something I like to call "list trees."

[list]
[*]Element 1
[list]
[*]Sub-element 1.1
[*]Sub-element 1.2
[/list]
[*]Element 2
[list]
[*]Sub-element 2.1
[list]
[*]Sub-sub-element 2.1.1
[/list][/list][/list]

• Element 1

  • Sub-element 1.1

  • Sub-element 1.2
    

• Element 2

  • Sub-element 2.1

    • Sub-sub-element 2.1.1
      

[list=1]
[*]Element1
[*]Element2
[*]Element3
[/list]

[list=I]
[*]Element1
[*]Element2
[*]Element3
[/list]

[list=A]
[*]Element1
[*]Element2
[*]Element3
[/list]

[list=i]
[*]Element1
[*]Element2
[*]Element3
[/list]

[list=a]
[*]Element1
[*]Element2
[*]Element3
[/list]

Putting all sorts of different types of these in list trees can help to define proposals of bills and make them clear and easy to read.

For instance, if bills were organized from Article (A), to Section (§), to Sub-section (§§), to Title (T), to Sub-title (t), and I wanted to express A.I, §.1, §§.A, T.i, t.a, I would say:

[list=I]
[*]Article 1
[list=1]
[*]Section 1
[list=A]
[*]Sub-section 1
[list=i]
[*]Title 1
[list=a]
[*]Sub-title 1
[/list][/list][/list][/list][/list]

Which turns out like:

1. Article I

   1. Section 1

      1. Sub-section A

         1. Title i

            1. Sub-title a
               

Size tags on NS work by using percentages of the normal text size. The largest is 1000%, and the smallest is 70%. Anything that you try to input that is outside of those bounds will be corrected back to 70 (if the value is <70) or 1000 (if the value is >1000).

Some [size=80]may[/size] say that [size=175]size[/size] [size=205]matters[/size], and it [size=500]does![/size]

Some may say that size matters, and it does!

Remember first that not all platforms or browsers have the font that you are trying to use, and thus the reader may not be able to read the font.

[font=Times New Roman]Woah, this is fancy![/font]

Unfortunately, due to site limits, images' height and width cannot be re-sized through the tags.

[img]https://www.nationstates.net/images/bymax9.png[/img]

Links to anywhere within the nationstates.net domain: ★ ★
Links to anywhere else: ☆ ★

If you want to view your telegrams, click [url=https://www.nationstates.net/page=telegrams]here[/url].

If you want to the Blockland Forums topic, click [url=http://forum.blockland.us/index.php?topic=278799.0]here[/url].

If you want to the Blockland Forums topic, click here.

Anchors work by defining a specific place within the page, and by clicking on a link, you jump to that place on the page with the defined area at the top of the browsing area. If you have been using the table of contents and the "Back to Top" links, you have been using anchors.

To name an anchor, you simply define it as follows:

[anchor=example1]Text[/anchor]

It looks like this:

Text

However, if you don't want to get that annoying anchor link, you can immediately close it before the text.

[anchor=example2][/anchor]Text

It looks like this:

Text

If you want to jump to the part of the page that you are currently on, and apply it into a url tag like usual, however, add #(anchorname) at the end.

[url=https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=418534#example1]Click this to jump to "Example 1"[/url]
[url=https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=418534#example2]Click this to jump to "Example 2"[/url]

Click this to jump to "Example 1"
Click this to jump to "Example 2"

☆ ★

[center]If you put text in here, it goes to the middle.[/center]

☆ ★

[align=right]This goes right.[/align]

☆ ★

[align=left]This goes left.[/align]

☆ ★

[align=center]This goes to the center.[/align]

☆ ★

[align=justify]This makes things evenly-spaced with the borders of the text within this field.  It attempts to make text within these rows have different spacing in order to try to make the text form a uniform block shape.  It will always conform to the left, but it is different because it tries to remain in a block shape.  As you can see, I needed to type out a large amount of text to show you what this does so bla bla bla here it is and I'm sorry that this had to be rediculously spammy in order to prove a point.[/align]

Tables are used to fit data in rows an columns.

To build a table, you need these:

1. [table][/table]

   tags must be placed on the outside of the table. They dictate where the table starts and ends.

2. [tr][/tr]

   tags must be inside the

   [table][/table]

   tags. These dictate the rows of the table.

3. [td][/td]

   tags must be placed inside the cells within the rows of the table. Make sure that you have an equal amount of cells in all your rows.

For more info on proper syntax, see the Syntax Guide.

Example:

[table][tr][td]Competitors[/td][td]Round 1[/td][td]Round 2[/td][td]Placement[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Competitor 1[/td][td][center]Wins
[size=80]vs. Competitor 2[/size][/center][/td][td][center]Looses
[size=80]vs. Competitor 4[/size][/center][/td][td]2nd[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Competitor 2[/td][td][center]Looses
[size=80]vs. Competitor 1[/size][/center][/td][td][center]Defeated[/center][/td][td]3rd[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Competitor 3[/td][td][center]Looses
[size=80]vs. Competitor 4[/size][/center][/td][td][center]Defeated[/center][/td][td]3rd[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Competitor 4[/td][td][center]Wins
[size=80]vs. Competitor 3[/size][/center][/td][td][center]Wins
[size=80]vs. Competitor 1[/size][/center][/td][td]1st[/td][/tr][/table]

As you notice, the top row will always be formatted with larger, bold text, and a darker background.

Floating is a type of aligning that does not displace horizontal space, but displaces horizontal space.

[floatright][table][tr][td]This is[/td][/tr][tr][td]a random table.[/td][/tr][/table][/floatright]If you want the text to be next to the table that has been floated to the right, you place it after the ending float tag.  Text will wrap around it.

Backgrounds can allow highlighting of [background=yellow]individual passages[/background], or with background blocks:
[background-block=#BBEEBB]They can be used to highlight entire lines.[/background-block]

[box]Boxes can surround text and stuff.[/box]

Sadly, boxes do not work within other boxes. The individual sections of this guide are build within boxes, so you get the idea. Boxes can also be aligned and floated.

You can vertically separate text...
[hr]
...with horizontal rules.

Parsing is essentially what the page does to interpret BBCode. When you tell it not to parse a passage, it will display the raw code. This is what has been done to allow you to see all the portions of code.

[pre]All the secrets are [b]revealed[/b]!

All the secrets are [b]revealed[/b]!

Spoilers are small buttons that can be used to show or hide text.

[spoiler]Woah, so secret![/spoiler]

You can also add your own custom text (replacing "Click to show..." only).

[spoiler=Mind =]Blown[/spoiler]

Supscript puts stuff [sup]above[/sup].

Subscript puts stuff [sub]below[/sub].