NationStates Jolt Archive

I know that the nation "Stars of Sky" has previously used the endorsement surfing tactic to keep up and build a large number of endorsements in an attempt to oust the delegate of The North Pacific.

If it has not been explained yet, endorsement surfing uses a glitch in the game to maintain endorsements in a region even though the nation doesn't stay in the region through update. In short, you get your endorsements in region "A" and then pull out and create a brand new region during the update period. As long as you keep creating new regions during each update period you do not lose your the endorsements you picked up in region "A". You can even swing through region "A" from time to time to get new endorsements which will likewise stay with you.

I do not know if Stars of Sky is still currently using this tactic, but would appreciate Moderator investigation.

More generally, I would like to know whether this tactic is allowed by the Moderation staff. It would make a nice addition to our arsenal of tricks, but only if the Mods say the tactic is allowable.

Thanks,

PR

The most recent precedent here, to my knowledge, was an incidental judgement in Faithful Lutherans v. Ballotonia.

It is very easy to defeat the update manually. I won't go into exact details, but the probability of the region you are currently in being updated is 16,000 to 1. It's just a matter of getting up at 7am BST and watching the UN page to see which region updates first. You can probably now work out very easily how it is done.
Whilst this may well be a dirty and unethical tactic, it is very hard to code out and has not (yet) been ruled illegal.

Ruling made on 26 April 2005 (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=8754662&postcount=17)

Incidentally, endorsement surfing has been used at least since the attempted NPO invasion of the South Pacific in early 2004 (link unvailable, as Network Radio I is currently down).

This has been discussed many times now. It is allowed to gather endorsements and avoid the update.

Goobergunchia and Cassandrah are correct. The described tactic is legal.

Because it is legal, we Moderators are not at liberty to reveal whether or not a particular nation is using this particular tactic.

--The Modified Democratic States of Cogitation
NationStates Game Moderator