Acadia: Difference between revisions

{{Infobox civilization|image=Flag of Acadia.png|position_name6=[[MetalHusband]]|area=6.731km²|position_name1=[[Cortwade]]|discord=[https://discord.gg/CK3AGcw CK3AGcw]|religion=Ashahari, Melonism, Bezism|culture_custom_title1=Population|culture_custom_value1=25 as of Nov. 1st, 2021|position_title6=Prime Minister|language=*English

*[[UNC]]|capital_city=New Turing|government_type=Parliamentary Constitutional Republic|demonym=Acadian|position_title1=Last Head of State (Ymir)|position_title2=Last Prime Minister|position_name2=[[JuniorTide]]}}

'''Acadia,''' officially the '''Republic of Acadia''' ([[Tahar|Simplified Tahar]]: '''''Dorei'Nothlir o Akkadye'''''), was a nation on [[CivUniverse]] and [[CivClassic]]. It was a parliamentary constitutional republic, and one of the few sizable civ-nations to operate through (semi-)direct democracy. Acadia held ancestry from [[Adina (CivClassics)|Adina]], [[Moloka]], [[Javaya]], and [[Norlund]], but was largely a newfriend nation with a diverse and welcoming community, mostly catering to a casual play-style. Acadia was founded on October 21st 2020, prior to the launch of CivUniverse, switched from CivUniverse to CivClassic on April 22nd 2021, where it existed until the end of the server on December 18, 2021.<ref>The first announcement on Acadia Discord: [https://imgur.com/a/ysmnXuO link] (imgur of discord message)</ref><ref>Final announcement of the migration: [https://imgur.com/a/ZXdm7CV link] (imgur of discord message)</ref> On CivUniverse, Acadia was a vassal state of Javaya. It had one of the largest populations of the server and was a notable exporter of hand-farmed potatoes. On Civclassic, Acadia was an associate member of the [[UDF]] and one of the key players in the deep northeast of the [[+,-|+,- quadrant]], mostly through having the largest population in the quadrant<ref>Excerpt from the November 2021 Census: [https://imgur.com/a/CsIPWW7 link] (imgur of document)</ref> and through its alliances.

Acadia was founded prior to [[CivUniverse]] by [[Cortwade]], who created the nation largely from [[Norlund|Norlundish]] and [[Adina (CivClassics)|Adinan]] culture. Although Acadian history starts from October 21 2020, Acadia held ancestry from the older nations of [[Norlund]], [[Adina (CivClassics)|Adina]], and [[Javaya]]. Acadia was founded to be a safe haven from toxicity and a welcoming home for newfriends and casual players, focussing on building and roleplay politics.<ref>Recruitment advertising: [https://www.reddit.com/r/CivUniverse/comments/km7dvb/general_recruitment_post_discussion/ghdc2od/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 link] (reddit comment)</ref> To ensure the nation's security, Acadia became a vassal state of [[Javaya]], which brought protection and guidance in return for potatoes for their xp-production. As Javaya's vassal Acadia became involved in the [[Great War (CivUniverse 1.0)|New Vegas War]] against [[New Vegas]] and its allies, increasing production for Javaya, delivering a few fighters, and enduring raids from New Vegas ally [[Savaguard]]. With CivUniverse losing activity Acadia migrated to [[CivClassic]], where it re-established itself as an independent nation in the [[+,-|+,- quadrant]]. While it never experienced a major conflict like on CivUniverse, it suffered from the tiresome TNSC conflicts centered around the controversial player [[RainOfPain125|Rainie]]. Acadia became increasingly involved in international politics and became an associate member of the [[UDF]] with close relations to [[Columbia]] and [[Icenia]].

Activity eventually reached new lows due to the rise in toxicity, especially from [[New Vegas]]. As a vassal state of Javaya, which joined the Coalition War on the side of the coalition, Acadia did not escape the war against New Vegas, suffering raids from New Vegas ally [[Savaguard]], and supplied fighters and entered a war economy through a War Bond exchange system to support the war efforts. Unfortunately, industrial output was impaired by the decline in activity and Acadia could not properly supply its fighters, leading to heavy casualties on the battlefield. The end of the war on March 10 2021 was celebrated with a national holiday, as Acadian pearls were freed and Acadia could now look toward its own future again. However, while Acadia, as one of few, carried on for a bit after the war, squashing the Tempestian uprising during which a group of new players supported by some citizens of Acadia's neighbour, the [[Hyperborean Confederation (CivUniverse)|Hyperborean Confederation]] overclaimed Acadian territory on April 3th, activity in both Acadia and the rest of the server was drastically reduced due to the war.<ref>Acadian statement regarding the Tempestia situation: [https://imgur.com/a/QA3myjn link] (imgur of discord message)</ref><ref>Tempestian 'Declaration of Independence': [https://www.reddit.com/r/CivUniverse/comments/mivcec/tempestia_will_not_bow_to_acadia/ link] (reddit post)</ref><ref>Confession on Hyperborea and Tempestia: [https://www.reddit.com/r/CivMC/comments/v203bh/comment/iapx7vk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 link] (reddit comment)</ref> Numbering around 30-strong at its peak, Acadia had only 10-15 active citizens when the decision to move to [[CivClassic]] was made.

[https://civwiki.org/wiki/Cortwade Cortwade] established claims for the Federal Republic of Acadia on Civclassic on March 10th, 2021<ref>Claims of Acadia on CivClassic: [https://www.reddit.com/r/civclassics/comments/m2fuow/claims_of_the_republic_of_acadia/ link] (reddit post)</ref> and the Acadian parliament officially voted in favor of the migration on April 4th.<ref>Conclusion of the vote: [https://imgur.com/a/f9adlXk link] (imgur of discord message) Note: display of April 5th instead of April 4th is due to time zone difference</ref> The migration finally took place on April 22th.<ref>Final announcement of the migration: [https://imgur.com/a/ZXdm7CV link](imgur of discord message)</ref> A key player during this transition was [[JuniorTide]], a player from Javaya who had left CivUniverse earlier already and established himself in [[Icenia]]. A large number of other Javayans joined Acadia as well, though from the Javayans only Juniortide[[JuniorTide]], [[LightningBerk]], and [[Egi]] would remain active in Acadia. The area chosen as the new homeland for Acadia, in the largely empty [[+,-|+,- quadrant]], had previously been part of the [[Chanseatic State]], before it was annexed and eventually unclaimed by [[Mir]]. To the west of the original claims of Acadia lay the old, heavily griefed ruins of [[Holy Tree (CivClassic)|Holy Tree]], and the Chanseatic town of Vanhoover, and many remnants of the past, including swastikas, wehrmacht flag banners, and Chanseatic State banners, were found here. Located in the deep northeast, a mostly undeveloped region of the map, Acadia originally had no close neighbours other than the aesthetic city of [[Gondolin]] to its south and a Mir exclave to its north, and Acadians began to lean even more into 'frontierism' as a key aspect of their identity.

With a sizable lake island in the middle of Acadia the choice of location for the new capital, New Turing, was easily made, and in a first wave of development a factory building, and a few residential and commercial buildings were quickly build, as well as the Acadian National Arena, and the prominent Perseverance Square, ofwith Perseverancea fountain built by [[SpacemanSpleef]], which would become the heart of Acadian life. However, unlike on CivUniverse, this time Acadia decided to be a federation with internal states and territories, and after the Capitol District with New Turing, the Territory of [[Babbage]] was quickly founded by [[Owain X|OwainX]] with state capital Lovelace, as well as the Territory of Kanava with the eponymous capital city of Kanava, and many more would follow. While much progress was made at the very beginning, further development stalled as people increasingly began to work on their own projects, with one Acadian building a private ore smelter before a communal ore smelter had been established, another working on private xp production, and others working on personal build projects away from New Turing. To a degree the fragmentation was encouraged with the Acadian Constitution granting a voting representative in the Senate, the executive body of the Acadian government, for every group of three or more people with their own State, which was later overturned during [[Kannon]]'s term as Prime Minister. Unfortunately, few settlements outside of New Turing ever became more than personal build projects and those that did never managed to keep activity up for long, which resulted in there being a large number of ghost towns sprawled throughout the previously mostly untouched landscape.

Unfortunately, the fall-out of Druid and JayTeeR's alt-raids ended up doing considerable damage to Acadia as several Acadians eventually ended up leaving and activity went down. Bloof, who had recently become Acadia's second Prime Minister after Cortwade's retirement after hitting his three term limit and a burnout, had initially set out to improve Acadia's international relations, but, with voice-chat game-afternoons and group projects, saw herself now forced to deal with the increasingly growing problem of inactivity as well. In matters of foreign affairs however, Acadia began to make progress, with Acadia growing closer to [[Columbia]], which had helped out Acadia during Druid and JayTeeR's alt-raid spree and set up a kickback trap featuring as embassy in New Turing. as well as Icenia, due to JuniorTideuniorTide's efforts.

The initial tensions were worsened when the leader of Jomsviking, [[Cat alunya|Alunya]], who held citizenship in Acadia, was declared POS by Prime Minister Owain, asking her to renounce her citizenship in Acadia in order for the POS to be removed. The Acadian Senate disagreed with this action and Owain briefly resigned, as well as Ymir Cortwade, as there was a heated discussion around whether the POS was an appropriate tool to use in this situation. Unfortunately, the Acadian Constitution did not allow the government or the National Assembly to remove an individual's citizenship. This was eventually fixed with an amendment, but together with a legal incident during the December elections where it took days for it to be established whether the Ministry of Foreign Affairs actually legally existed and whether an election for the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs was to be held, this highlighted a growing problem with Acadia's legal system. Acadia, no longer a simple newfriend nation, had fully outgrown its original Constitution, and, at the same time, with all its amendments which at times conflicted with each other, the Acadian legal system had become increasingly complex, to the point where there was in practice only one Acadian, [[Aelfred]], who fortunately happend to be the Chief Justice, could somewhat effectively navigate through it. This complexity exacerbated the already existing presence of e-lawyerism in Acadia.[[File:Render of New Turing, Acadia, 8-12-2021.png|left|thumb|364x364px339x339px|Last render of New Turing, 8/12/2021, made by Cortwade]]In the meantime, New Turing, for the first time, began to thrive as [[Yoahtl|Yoahtlan]] economic presence began to grow in the city and a large newfriend wave increased activity and the need for more residential units. Acadia's population count was on the rise again, reaching 25 in November 2021.<ref>Excerpt from the November 2021 Census: [https://imgur.com/a/CsIPWW7 link] (imgur of document)</ref> Many residential units, as well as commercial units, and a new, larger factory and storage building were built by [[TheGreatUniter]] who had recently started playing on CivClassic and joined Acadia. Whereas New Turing never managed to find a convincing, cohesive general aesthetic before, and was limited by the small-scale Acadian architectural norms, Uniter introduced a new architectural style for the city, with taller and more detailed buildings. His style proved succesful as more buildings in Uniter's style began to pop up and genuine excitement about the future of New Turing began to emerge. Redevelopment continued, with the government discussing far reaching plans to increase its control over the capital to organize its redevelopment and to find a way around the e-lawyerism and lack of executive tools that made derelicting unused, unaesthetic buildings in the capital near impossible. Center to the redevelopment plan was to remove the western half of the large boulevard reaching down to the quartz Parliament building construction site, as well the largely unfinished Parliament building itself, which after many months of stalled construction had become a symbol of New Turing's previous stagnation.

However, these plans never came to be, as the Acadian government received word that the server was about to end, and with the incident of [[Pearled Harbor]] following. In the last few days of the server, a number of Acadians attended the 2021 Winter Olympics in [[Rotterdam]], Columbia, with Bloof winning silver medals for Acadia in archery and pvp tournament.<ref>Acadian Olympic Medals: [https://imgur.com/a/AtPszx2 link] (imgur of discord message)</ref> With the server finally shutting down on December 18th 2021, Acadia's history on CivClassic came to an end. Unlike many other nations on CivClassic however, Acadia did not make the move to CivClassics´s successor server [[CivMC]]. Cortwade resigned as High Commissar/Ymir with no successor appointed, and JuniorTide was later appointed Prime Minister, heading the Acadian community after its time as a nation on CivUniverse and CivClassic.

Another prominent aspect of Acadian culture was its use of [[Tahar|Simplified Tahar]], brought to Acadia from the Adina/Moloka/Javaya line, as the official language, featured in many official documents and titles. The language has its own vocabulary and grammar, as well as its own unique script.<ref>The script can be downloaded as a text font: [https://discord.com/channels/768259087133048882/768259909078220841/928045068596699247 link] (imgur of discord message)</ref> Despite the prominent use of Tahar, there were only ever a handful of speakers. Nevertheless, enthusiasm for Tahar persisted among its supporters and the language is currently undergoing increased interest and attempts to improve its documentation.<ref>Announcement of the Tahar Synod: [https://imgur.com/a/MjROmCk link] (imgur of discord message)</ref>

While Acadia never had an official national religion, due to the influence from Javaya and the legacy of Adina, Ashahari, a branch from [[Indoja]], was close to a national religion as it was by far the most dominant civ-religion in Acadia and had become central to Acadia's national identity. Two prominent political parties were formed after Ashahari values, though neither of them argued for a theocracy or an official national religion. Followers of Ashahari believe in a monotheistic deity, Ashahari, who is one with the universe. While being a non-corporal all-encompassing entity Ashahari manifests through Avatars. Many Ashaharist tend to focus their worship on specific avatars, leading to the in Acadia dominant denominations of Peleism; where Ashaharist worship the Avatar Pele, the manifestation of Ashahari as a cyclical force of creation and renewal, and Lunism; where Ashaharists worship the Avatar Luna, the manifestation of Ashahari as a watcher against the evils of darkness emphasizing unity and harmony.<ref>Officially recognized religions in Acadia: [https://imgur.com/a/48v1Jlh link] (imgur of discord message)</ref> Despite there being no lack of devotion, no Ashahari temple was eventually ever built in Acadia, although there were multiple plans to do so, including a large castle build with temple by former Javayan emperor [[Kalipso]].<ref>Plans for the Ashahari Community Center: [https://imgur.com/a/y5pKaLo link] (imgur of discord message)</ref>

On CivClassics, Acadia kept much of the capitalist and individualist nature it had developed in CivUniverse, and while in the very beginning Acadians often had to rely on mining andto buyingbuy high value products in Icenia, 20 minutes away, some Acadians quickly established private production of prot, XP, and potions, with The Lovelace Company and Steve Corp playing a particularly large role in this development. Throughout Acadia's history it has also known several different manufacturers of enchanted tools, though the international competition in this sector was tough. As individual capitalist ventures grew less popular throughout time, national (collective) production of XP began to speed up around the end of Acadia's history on CivClassic, with national prot and tools production only held off because of delayed plans to build a small vault in which those factories would then have been housed. Around the end of Acadia's time on CivClassic, Acadia began to develop a small economy, now also hosting among others a nethertree shop and a map-art shop, and with small-scale privatecommercial production of elytra's and netherite ingots. However, the limits of CivClassic's post-scarcity server economy, the geographic isolation of Acadia, and lack of international profile limited the potential of growing a fully functioning economy, and export remained an unsolved challenge. The result of this was a rather insulated economy, exemplified by the used diamond/iron exchange rate which, unlike in the rest of the server, remained stable at 1:30 throughout Acadia's time on CivClassic.

[[File:Acadiaball politics.png|thumb|287x287px|Politics Acadiaball, made by Bloof]]Acadia was sometimes considered to be somewhat of a 'Norlund spin-off', as Acadia's governmental system was much inspired by Norlund's. On CivUniverse Acadia took the form of a parliamentary constitutional republic as a dominion of Javaya, whilewith onthe CivClassicConstitution at the grace of Emperor of Javaya who held the power to void it at any moment's notice. On CivClassic Acadia was a federal parliamentary constitutional republic as an independent nation. The final Constitution of Acadia and its ten amendments can be found [https://sites.google.com/view/acadialii/home here] as well as on Acadia's discord. The head of state of Acadia was the Ymir, originally called the High Commissar, instituted part way through CivClassic, who held the namelayer groups and was responsible for organizing elections.<ref>The Seventh Amendment: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/17dmfKy3pdeOFRoO-mNUtH5ms9qoqXkmEGmzgKA6zcVM/edit link] (Google document)</ref> The head of government was the Prime Minister, who was the chief diplomat and presided over the Senate (''I'Nothlir Farroth''), the executive body, composed of all other ministers who were, with the Prime Minister, each individually elected. In the later stages of CivClassic, one exception to this was the Minister of Defense, who was then elected by the Sel'mean, a military council, who were in turn appointed by the National Assembly (''I'Dorei Sabar''). The Acadian Parliament consisted of the National Assembly and the Senate. The National Assembly was the primary legislative body, composed of all citizens, where people could propose and vote on legislation, which could then be vetoed by the Senate. The Senate also had the power to make legislation, with the National Assembly able to veto if a large majority was against. Outside of legislation, ministers could institute executive orders within their scope of discretion. The Prime Minister and the other ministers were elected for one month each term (not counting time between servers), with a limit of three terms for the Prime Minister. The Ymir was elected for six months, with a monthly vote of trust in the National Assembly. Additionally, while earlier a Chief Justice was temporarily appointed by the National Assembly when needed for criminal and constitutional matters, this later on became a permanent for-life position, evolving into a prominent national advisor to help the Senate and the National Assembly navigate Acadia's increasingly complex legal system.

Ministers were subject to heavy scrutiny, and mistakes which could fairly easily be made given the complex legal system could lead a large group of Acadians to start an impeachment procedure. While noonly one impeachment was ever succesful, a large number of them where launched or threatened throughout Acadia's history. Especially the office of the Prime Minister could be hard, as the burden of preserving unity fell mostly on them. Two Prime Ministers, Kannon and Owain, resigned or almost resigned and both refused to run for more than one term.

One of the most loved and respected builds was the '''Acadia Grand Central Station'''. It was the main transportation hub in Hyperborea, linking all settlements in Hyperborea with each other, and linking the continent to the rest of the server with a direct line to the motherland, Javaya. Built in typical traditional old Turing architecture with brick and stone brick, it's the main representative build of this style. The '''Aston Tower''', built by Cortwade, largely followed these same architectural conventions like most buildings in old Turing. Housing a number of newfriend apartments, it was the tallest building in all of [[Hyperborea]] for several months, until becoming the second tallest after the completion of Iceton Tower in the [[Republic of Lunalia]] , dominating the old Turing skyline. It represented a move towards urbanization as old Turing was growing quickly in its latest weeks. Another landmark came from the same urbanization rush; the '''Supreme Tribunal''' building by [[Huntwolf]], an example of Acadia's occasional flirtation with quartz. It was the only Acadian government building that was ever finished.[[File:New Turing screenshot.png|thumb|342x342px|The Community Center and the Columbian embassy in New Turing]]

The '''Rainbow Row''', built by Bloof, was one of New Turing's most successful residential and commercial projects. As New Turing sat upon a large height difference with the surrounding lake, waterfront development was a challenge; however; the Rainbow Row's visibility ensured its inclusion in commercial traffic. It eventually became associated with the later rainbow hot air balloon and the gaybar as monuments to Acadia's LGBT+ community. Another important landmark was the '''National Arena,''' designed by Owain in antiquity inspired architecture, the first major break from traditional Acadian architecture. Situated between the early settlements of New Turing, Lovelace, and Kanava rather than in the capital, it was a monument to Acadia's federalism on CivClassic. Unfortunately, perhaps partly due to its remoteness, it was never put to use. Another building that never quite hit its goal was the unfinished '''Capitol Building''', designed by [[Seekinq]] and central part of Cortwade´s vision for New Turing. As time went on the building became a controversial symbol of inactivity, and it began to highlight struggles with city planning as it clashed with the skybunker and the boulevard descending to the building clashed with kick-back traps. Right before the announcement of the end of the server, a plan for urban renewal was formed which would have had this entire area removed and rebuilt. Symbol of the same wave of urban renewal was the new '''Community Center''' with factories and large communal storage, built by Uniter, and the tallest building in New Turing. Finally, one of Acadia's most controversial buildings; the '''Vegan Steakhouse''' by Spleef[[SpacemanSpleef]]. Due to its lack of aesthetic value and the fact that it was hardly ever stocked, the Acadian government wished to derelict this building. However, given Acadia's strong property rights, which did not allow for confiscation as long as the owner objected on Discord, and popular disapproval of what many saw as 'government overreach', the building led to one of Acadia's biggest storms of e-lawyerism.<ref>Debate on the Vegan Steakhouse and derelictions: [https://imgur.com/a/tNiiwBz link] (imgur of discord messages)</ref>