Sovia (CivMC)

The Free Territory of Sovia, or Sovia is a nation on the CivMC server. It is one of the oldest continious groups of Civ, with a history stretching back over 6 years. Despite countless setbacks and servers, some core Sovians are still actively playing, alongside many new friends they have met along the way.

Sovia is an anarchist nation, home to many known players of the Civ genre, old and new. Across the years, it believed in the right for the self-determination and freedom of all players. It is strongly opposed to imperialist actions, thus becoming a target for various forces that wanted to destroy it. However, all attempts failed due to the Sovians' determination and strong will to resist the invaders. Up to the present day, they stand proud, unbroken by all those who opposed them but always warm to all nations that desire a peaceful and fair world.

Sovia is home to a diverse array of individuals, with varying beliefs. The welcoming nature of the nation makes it a home for people fleeing from oppression, as they historically stood against powerful foes that caused pain and despair to innocents. The Sovian heritage is impressive, containing memes, jokes and achievements such as the first XP exchange and an expansive XP industry. Despite its pacifist stance, Sovia has a prolific military, renowned for its capabilities against far greater enemies, due to the need to defend resulting from its long history of struggle.

Etymology
The name "Sovia" was initially chosen during Devoted 2.0 in 2016 for ambiguous reasons. It was likely chosen to project power, under the old Sovian king Henry_VII alongside leader Laikalike who ruled a constitutional monarchy under a communist aesthetic. After Pirater's re-unification of the Sovian lands during Devoted 2.0, the name was retained and has stuck ever since.

History
For the history of Sovia on previous servers, read Sovia and Sovia (Post-CivClassic) 

Even before the start of the server, the Sovians were active, especially on Discord. There, they crafted the current political system, decided on the flag and researched building styles.

15th April 2022 - The Funko Pop Incident
Over the course of a few days, Sovians and others interacted with a user named Dyl in the CivMC discord. He posted pictures of his funko pop collection and in generally acted obnoxious and stupid towards people who disagreed with him, especially those that called him out for his Funko Pop collection and for his behaviour. On 15th April 2022, he had enough and left but not without throwing a fit at people like Khardbass, Pirater and Yaahya. After that, people talked about the recent happenings and his Funko Pop collection, which he frequently brought up. Jokes were made on the subject, only for Wingzero, an admin, to ban people even remotely in the ongoing conversation. Thus, Sovians were banned. Later that evening, the COMRADES founding convention was held. There, the incident was discussed and the FunkoCoin was created as the alliance's common currency in remembrance of the event.

Geography
The Free Territory is centered around the town of Sovia City, that is practically its capital.

Demography
Sovia has a large population with players from all around the world, as well as a variety of players from different civ nations on previous servers.

Culture
Sovian culture is one of the oldest continuous cultures on the civ genre, stretching back over 6 years with the initial formation of Sovia on Devoted 2.0. Sovia is a hard-working nation, with everyone from highly skilled builders, grinders and PvPers. Historically, Sovia is a nation against hegemony, and against those who attempt to impose their will on independent nations. Anarchism is a core component of the Sovian mind, as Sovians would rather fight for their freedom than concede to the will of foreign tyrants. Despite the excellence of the Sovian Black Army, fighting is often a last choice, only used in the face of attempted invasion or those who attempt to harm Sovians without due reason.

Sovians have a history of cartography, art work, civball drawing, propaganda designing and much more. In previous iterations, Sovia was a cultural powerhouse producing memes and propaganda at a high quality level, allowing Sovian culture to spread. The national animal of Sovia is the caracal, a freedom-loving animal which is friendly but violent when provoked or attacked. A popular religion in Sovia is the Cult of Caracal, with several discord channels dedicated to posting gifs of the majestic animal.

Economy
The Sovian economy is based on cooperatives on the civilian side, with military production being more organized and centralized. Unions share resources in ways which benefit them, such as the miner's union trading ores to the military union in exchange for protection and security of infrastructure. Each citizen has a right to the fruits of their labour, although sharing is encouraged between citizens for the common good and development of the territory.

Sovian culture holds an agrarian character, with farms and cities often bordering, and this integration of rural and urban creates an interesting dichotomy. In historical iterations, Sovians went as far as to have farms on their rooves, providing a green touch to the cities. This harmony between agriculture and living is essential to Sovia, as it places each citizen close to the center of the economy. XP production has been critical historically. On CivClassics 2.0, wjkroeker established the first XP Co-Operative/Exchange in New Sovia. Despite the small amount of time it lasted for (as a result of the World Police invasion), this was a game-changer for the server, with even those who disliked Sovia (such as Icenians) adopting the system. This system allows citizens to farm ingredients, then exchanged them for emeralds. This allows citizens to specialize in a certain type of crop (e.g. Carrot Farmer), and exchange it using Item Exchanges for experience. This system was revolutionary at the time, and remains so to this day. Up until 2021, New Sovia's XP in 2019 was sold for the cheapest price possible, a whopping 1-2 diamonds less than all their competitors. Alongside this system, public farms give citizen the opportunity to make some easy XP through simply doing a small amount of farming in return for proportional XP.

During the CivRev era, Sovia was the birthing place of the Drigonist economical doctrine. Developed by Sovian thinker Drigon, it was a new theory that stood against the planned economies of socialist nations and the free market capitalism present in many nations on Civ. It allowed Sovia to expand industrially at an astonishing rate without having to infringe on the freedoms of its citizens. In one weekend, Sovia was able to develop the XP industry and an ore smelter on its own, except for a pickaxe donated by their close friends from Fortuna. Sovia quicly became an XP producer of higher calibre until the server went inactive.

Politics
The politics of Sovia are a form of synthesis anarchism, with a majority of members spanning across both libertarian left and libertarian right. A variety of unions exist from building to fighting, each ran democratically and allowed to determine its own destiny. Each union will be in charge of its infrastructure and the unions all contributing to the wellbeing of eachother will theoretically produce a healthy, free society where everyone is free from poverty and free to pursue their own goals on the server. As the territory lacks full centralization, it is protected under the military union/black army, under the nation's ataman Pirater to enable the society to run without great threat from raiders and invaders. The council is made up of any active citizen who invests enough time and effort into the city, and aims at an egalitarian form of government where each citizen who truly contributes to the territory will be admitted. The council is used for the purposes of foreign diplomacy, internal decision making and co-ordination between unions.

Sovian politics are inspired by a wide variety of political ideologies around the libertarian-left perspective. This includes Volin's Synthesis anarchism, Nestor Makhno's Free State, Leo Tolstoy's anarchism, Max Stirner's egoism, Kropotkin's bread book and more. Despite the nation being somewhat economically and culturally left wing, many right wing elements are also brought in from libertarians. This synthesis of left wing libertarianism and right wing libertarianism creates a unique culture where both sides are able to put aside their differences and have friendly relations. This pragmatic element of multiple different types of libertarianism/anarchism is what gives Sovia a unique status among the groups on the server, and what splits them from more dogmatic groups such as the IWW. There is a strong stance against actions such as perma pearling, which serve only to dullen the server, remove the homogeneity of cultures and flatten the server into a bland monoculture where everyone who takes action against an invading group is permanently pearled.

Sovians holds many values to the forefront, such as freedom of speech, freedom of thought and freedom for oppression. The willingness of Sovians to be honest and stick to their values has historically created tension between those who support the traditional idea of Civ servers as ones where ideologies can clash and it's up to the players to decide punishments, and those who would like admins to ban anyone outside their preferred overton window simply for stating a viewpoint without any harassment. Sovia is unique as a nation where one can hold almost any non-authoritarian ideology and feel free to discuss/debate it among their members. Members of Sovia include groups as diverse as socialists, communists, anarcho-primitivists, anarcho-communists, libertarians, theists, atheists and anarcho-capitalists all in pursuit of a common freedom to live their lives away from the tyranny of international power blocs.

There are many political factions within Sovia.

Military
The Sovian military is the Sovian Black Army, commanded by the Ataman, Pirater. The military serves as the backbone and protection of the free territory, allowing the unions and citizens to operate without fear of raiders and foreign invaders. The military union offers a variety of training programs to help citizens develop fighting ability, and aims to prepare every citizen to be able to fight those who would dare come and take their freedom. Training will also be provided to those of across the map who fear invasion and oppression. It is the goal of Sovia's military that each individual should be able to defend themselves from those who desire to tread on them - as no group should be allowed to use the server as their private stomping grounds.

It is a well trained fighting force, with veterans from several other Civ and Geopolitical servers. On other iterations, Sovia received distinction for their actions of guerilla warfare and trickery, and inspired fear in the hearts of tyrants and leaders across the map. This created such fear that a mass formation psychosis developed, where for a short period, everyone believed almost any new alt to be Pirater. Despite having very few raids, the thought of Sovian guerillas infiltrating nations created such fear that they began to implement security and identity checks to stop them.

Foreign Relations
Sovia enjoys excellent relations with various nations, such as Lusitania. Sovia seeks to establish reasonable non-aggression treaties with any interested nations, in the purpose of establishing a lasting peace and establishing mutual understanding between nations.

Current treaties signed by Sovia include


 * Sovia-Lusitan Non Aggression Treaty with Lusitania (CivMC)
 * Sovia-Cortesia Defense Treaty with Cortesia Del Mar

Even more, Sovia maintains close relations with many other nations, such as Rhode Island.

Sovia is one of the founding members of the COMRADES alliance.