Guide:Nation

**This is originally from flameoguy's post 'How to Start Nations'. The post was originally for 1.0 but it applies for 2.0 perfectly.**

It seems that recently, a lot of nations have been founded carelessly via lazily made introduction posts that give little info about the country. They also may be poorly set up, and have unoriginal plans and ideas for their country.

Here is a guide on how to properly establish your nation so that it may thrive as a part of the server.

*Note: While it is necessary to follow each major part in order, the individual sections within are completely free to complete in any order.*

## Preliminary Work

Before your nation becomes a thing, there's some basic stuff you have to do first.

### The Land

A good aspect to a nation is it's selling point, the thing that makes it special. You want an idea for a country that sets you apart from other nations, in order for people to live there. This main idea can be a type of ideology, a new form of government, a strange and interesting building style, or a main export for the nation. Pick an idea, and let your imagineation run with it, but try avoiding dead horse ideas like 'peaceful mining and farming colony' or 'land of communism and broken grammar'.

### Settling the Idea

Now, you're going to have to choose a location for your nation. Travel around in-game and find an area that looks like a good place to build a city. Set up a small shack to keep the mobs out and mine some ores, and build a farm so you can feed yourself. Set up a mine, lock your chests, and if possible, build a bed. Really, just make the bare minimum for staying alive. You can try asking nearby nations for food and tools to help you with this.

Post a sign near your house claiming it as yours, and possibly your nation name. Be sure that this area is *not* within the claim of any other established nations.

### Getting My Starting Members

Single-Man nations founded out of the blue are frowned upon and destined to fail. A good way to stop this from happening is to get some members before you even announce your nation. Invite any real-life friends who play Minecraft to join your nation, and if you know anyone from the internet, you can invite them in. You can even invite other close friends from this server to come join you!

## Founding Some Nations

It's time to make you're nation's intro post to the CivilEx subreddit, to let others know about your nation and how to join.

### Symbols

One of the most important things for a nation is it's government. A government decides how the nation is run and makes important decisions for it. Outline your government in a mini-constitution, explaing how people in power come to be, and different policies on citizenship and you may have. A common theme is to have your government be an oligharchy, that is a comittee of trusted and privelaged players run the nation. An efficient government might be a constitutional monarchy, where one person makes most descisions, but the public can veto them via 2/3 vote. It's really up to you to choose a government that suits your nation!

### National Government

Are you feeling patriotic? You may want some symbols for your nation. Choose a national anthem (it can be any old song on youtube) for your nation, and design a flag that represents your nation in MS Paint. You can make some other national symbols such as a motto, minecraft mob, or seal that represents your nation. Be creative!

### Land Claim

Ever since the Eight States Age, nations have used claims of land to assert their territory. Outline a land claim including your main city's site on the Territory Map (http://www.reddit.com/r/CivilizatonExperiment/comments/36bwb8/territory\_map/) in Microsoft Paint. Make sure to keep your claim reasonable. You do not want to make your claim too large, or claim over a large amounts of rare land formations such as redstone spires. To avoid invasion, attack, and other things that may be destructive to a starting nation, do not claim other nations' land. Add a link to your claim map in your post, and make sure people don't accidentially annex you!

It is not necessary to use the claims map to outline your borders. Many nations use it to to keep everything organized but it isn't required. Borders in CivEx are what you and your nation can physically maintain and protect. Just because you claim land doesn't mean other nations can't use it or take it from yours.

### Subreddit

Any nation worth it's land will provide a little forum for it's members to communicate on. Since subreddits are free, and this server is very active on reddit, creating a subreddit is a popular choice for a national forum. If you want your subreddit to be confidential, privatize it. If you want other players to be able to see the latest news about your nation (or for those nations with an open-door policy), then make your national subreddit public. Link to your subreddit in your post so that people may talk to one another!