Imperium Offtopicum

"I declare war. Good luck."
— Joecoolyo

"Jesus Christ, what the hell have you guys been doing?"
— choxorn

Imperium Offtopicum (abbreviated IOT, or rarely IO) is a geopolitical scandal simulation that spawned out of the Altered Maps thread in Off-Topic. It is roughly comparable effectively identical to NES and the political scenarios played out within the DYOS series.

The IOT concept is similar to other (past) forum games, e350tb's Island Game and War At CivFanatics, which was originally started by Swedishguy and lasted four incarnations, plus a Civ4 scenario.

Premise

"The altered maps threads have always been mostly nonsense."
— Shekwan

Participants roleplay as leaders of a country, claiming land, manipulating world politics to their liking, enjoying total imaginary power over their subjects and the resources of their nations, with the exception of nuclear weapons, which are banned the cornerstone of a delightful game experience.

Perhaps For this reason, the game attracted notable megalomaniacs DYOSers: taillesskangaru, CivGeneral, Perfection, e350tb, Gruekiller, choxorn, mythmonster2, Thorvald of Lym, Kan' Sharuminar, and Omega124. Games they played have been lampooned several times in DYOS.

Prologue

"I like how this started out as "claim a country or two" which everyone promptly ignored and proceeded to claim a dozen countries at a time and turn it into some sort of NES anarchy."
— SuperBeaverInc.

On March 13, 2010, in the sixth Altered Maps thread in the Off-Topic forum, taillesskangaru declared that "I am bored, so I'm going to rename the world's countries after posters here" and invited forumers to lay claim to regions of the world. Seventeen hours and fifty-three minutes into the experiment, Shekwan introduced a political dimension when he threatened to go to war with Huayna Capac357. Diplomacy rapidly developed as Joecoolyo and Mathalamus entered into a serious war over conflicting claims. The situation very quickly got out of hand (in fact, at one point Mecca was nuked), and by the next day vehement protests by players and unaffiliated forumers alike led to the exercise being moved to Forum Games, where such spammish content belongs.

OT Poster Empires

Lil Post count created the spin-off thread, dubbed "OT Poster Empires", early March 14, which was soon moved to Forum Games. Multiple wars quickly broke out between various countries (and this time Mecca was definitely nuked), but as the game lacked even a nominal moderator, their resolution was always in a state of flux and subject to arbitrary pronouncements. Taniciusfox proposed a set of rules to supply a basic structure that became the foundation for Imperium Offtopicum. Lil meanwhile began screaming for the thread to be locked; while the mods ignored his demand, most of the players agreed to restart with the new game. Tanicius launched "Imperium Offtopicum" the same day with himself as the first in a long line of suffering game moderators.

Imperium Offtopicum I

Battle of (my country) against (your country)
Location Earth Result entire army of (your country) pulverized and reduced to atoms Strategic (my country) victory
Belligerents
(my country)	(your country)
Strength
one old grandma from the nearest village	100 million of the most elite warriors that the entire nation has to offer
Casualties and losses
none	all 100 million died within a second
Adapted from this Reddit thread.

The inaugural Imperium Offtopicum thread aired March 15, 2010. The game took place in the modern age, with an empty world map; it is implied that all governments and states have for some reason ceased to exist, leaving people in need of arbitrary autocratic rule by violent gamers who have too much time on their hands guidance. The world was divided up, slice by slice, to the participants, who roughly stated their nations' stats and government policies within the confines of realistic possibilities. The IOT world was assumed to be similar to that of Earth in 2010, except for a ban on nuclear weapons, and choosing a particular starting location meant the player inherits its resources, people, economy and its problems. Due to the unrestrained nature of the games, posters massaged the statistics, which would later lead to powergaming galore. All combat was determined by dice rolls in a vein similar to Roll to Dodge. A United Nations "Union of Nations" thread was created to oversee expansion and territorial disputes.

"What I can't accept is you pulling crap out of your ass, having an army more than double the size of mine when I have 10 times more people than you do, making that army way more advanced than feasible, having an economy bigger than you can reasonably support, and pretending you can be completely self-sustainable and ignore everyone else. Stop powergaming, and stop making the Byzantines into a nation-sized Mary Sue."
— choxorn on the powergame shenanigans in Imperium Offtopicum

Friction between players, spam, powergaming and the insane pace of diplomatic rows and war declarations soon got out of hand. Powergame plays by one forumer Mathalamus, leader of the Byzantines, caused particular dismay among the other participants. The friction with Mathalamus has been lampooned by CivGeneral and Thorvald of Lym within DRAW Your Own Story.

Taniciusfox played with the idea of launching a new IOT game ("Imperium Offtopicum 2.0") but it did not eventuate. He would later say that becoming the game's GM was a "great mistake" and on March 30 passed the GMship to Mad Man. Mad Man would later state that he "never failed as horribly as I did" as he tried to control and keep up with the unruly, quibbling, quarrelling, at times self-righteous posters.

Imperium Offtopicum III

"I'm bored, so I decide to send out Jet Fighter's to my statue in Byzantium (on the former site of my Embassy) to blow it up. On the site, I instead build a 1000 foot tall statue of me flipping the bird to Constantinople and all of Byzantium."
— Joecoolyo

Typical Game Moderator

Under Mad Man's GMship, the game restarted with mostly the same rules as IOT I. It was the first to use a map with national subdivisions, replacing the mind-numbing pixel-by-pixel fronts of IOT 1 with RISK-like province-based conquests that laid the foundation for virtually every game to follow. Miraculously, unlike its predecessors it saw little direct combat until the end, with players actually championing the art of roundtable diplomacy and managing a 'critical mass' of self-government that had eluded the previous threads. Whether this was out of aversion to Mad Man's novel combat system of dance videos has not been decisively proven.

Although IOT III suffered from the same problems that plagued IOT I, it nevertheless lasted until May 16, when an explosion of peer-to-peer wars became overwhelming and Mad Man passed the GMship to Thorvald of Lym. A brief brainstorm followed, and the complaints in this thread were addressed in the improvements that went into IOT IV. While Joecoolyo claimed IOT III "wasn't really much of a ... game as it was a kinda mini-developmental thread", Thorvald would tout it as the only game in the franchise's history in which (most) players didn't mindlessly chase war as their first recourse, and as such, actually succeeded as a crude simulation of modern geopolitics.

Imperium Offtopicum IV

"Across the entire world, never stopping, never faltering, never fading. Canadians and hockey players and mounties will become dust. And the dust will become atoms and the atoms will become...nothing. And the atomic bombs will continue, breaking through the maple syrup at the heart of Ontario into every city, every province, every single corner of Canada. This is my ultimate victory, Captain2! The destruction of Canada itself!"
— Kan' Sharuminar

With the crash and burn of Mad Man's Imperium Offtopicum III, the community voted to start over. Thorvald of Lym volunteered to host the game, and soon set out trying to bring order to IOT, Consul-style. IOT was fortified with new rules, including limits on territorial expansions, and an overhaul of the battle system (Thorvald started simulating battles with Operation Flashpoint).

As the game progressed, nations in Europe, Asia and North America formed themselves into power blocs and proceeded to lob accusations of imperialism left, right and centre in the hope of provoking a world war without actually firing the first shot. This caused a few players to headdesk. Posting quality declined rapidly and the thread became cluttered with spam, further aggravated by the emergence of Domination3000, who proved possibly the most rabid warmonger in IOT history when he nuked Thorvald's GMPC for not getting his way in a territorial dispute. In deciding battle results, Thorvald went from simulating military engagements to using dice rolls to flipping a coin, due to the ridiculously massive amount of activity in the thread. In the middle of all this, Taniciusfox lampooned the conflict between Math and Omega124 in a DYOS comic.

"Just to give you an idea of how bad the spam has become: Methos contacted me back and said he wouldn't take the time to investigate all the flags I raised."
— Thorvald of Lym

After a brief suspension as the IOT development thread went to air (see below), Thorvald reopened the thread in a reduced fashion, but now gave each player 8 nuclear weapons to use on each other in MAD shenanigans, in an attempt to at least allow IOT IV to come to a complete finish by tying these nukes to prestige and reputation, with a winner being declared based on the highest of these amounts. The nascent Third World War quickly devolved into a chaotic free-for-all as allies turned on each other and formerly-neutral nations randomly lobbed missiles for the lolz. True to his promise, Thorvald reinstated OFP simulations for select battles. On August 27, and after 28 updates, he announced the conclusion of the game. The thread officially ended the next month with an epic epilogue written by Thorvald.

Despite being drowned in spam, IOT IV was the second-longest-lasting game by total updates, and came to be considered the best iteration of the "original" IOT format. Its ruleset served as the blueprint for virtually every game that immediately followed, and several future games by other GMs claimed themselves IOT IV's spiritual successor. The poster Reiser expressed interest in running a "story-driven" sequel, though he seemed to have been taken by Teh Alienz. In January of the following year, Thorvald announced tentative plans for a relaunch in late Spring; "Imperium Offtopicum: The Aftermath" aired in May, running for three months and a venerable 19 turns.

War of Imperian Succession

"Ugh, Tanicius, could you please hold off on forming IOT V (for some strange reason you keep calling it IOT II)."
— Joecoolyo

"IOT can be based on authoritarianism, ICF can be based on democracy. We shall see which one emerges victorious!"
— Taniciusfox

On June 20, 2010, Thorvald froze Imperium Offtopicum IV due to massive spamming. Attempting to resolve the issues in the game, Joecoolyo began an "IOT Developmental Thread" to collect suggestions for what he hoped to become a workable, collaboratively-designed version of the game. However, Taniciusfox launched "Operation: Usurpation", an attempt to retake control of IOT after Thorvald refused to relinquish his thread, claiming IOT IV would never resume and purporting to fulfil a "promise" for an "official" sequel, claiming copyright of the emerging IOT "brand".

taillesskangaru retaliated by asserting himself the rightful heir, and some posters thought a three-way power struggle between TF, TK, and ToL (the Triple Ts) was imminent. Joe was less than amused, accusing Tanicius of sabotage, but stated community development would continue, in contrast to Tanicius' self-described authoritarian approach to game development. The brainstorm phase was originally scheduled for about a week but ended after three days; these suggestions were voted on in eleven rounds spanning June 23‒July 9, with the first draft of the rules penned by taillesskangaru and submitted for appraisal July 20. A streamlined version was officially adopted July 31, with the game launching the next day.

Imperium Offtopicum II

"cool story bro"
— Zack

Tanicius originally delayed launching IOT II out of fear it would be struck down by the mods while IOT IV was officially active, but his impatience got the better of him and he aired the game June 21 with a combination of his own revisions and pointers stolen from the Development Thread. Only several turns in, a large war had already broken out focused on the Americas, with several European nations choosing sides. One nation—wait make that two—dropped out due to the headache the war caused, and Tanicius began to enforce anti-spam rules—including warning the war's initiator, Domination3000. In response to the warmongers, several players stated IOT was not supposed to be a war game, while noting that the rules did a poor job of encouraging diplomacy. Tanicius equivocated, stating it was both.

"You have so badly raped my attempt to regain my honor that I want to cry . . . ."
— Lighthearter

As the thread dragged on, Domination began to play Pot-Kettle-Black, targeting Mathalamus for powergaming and declaring war on Mexico, then peace, no wait war again, then split into four nations in a civil war. Facepalms ensued. Hours later, Domination ragequit, and the entire IOT rejoiced! ...or would have, but he promptly rejoined as La Plata. Not long after, choxorn lampooned this in DYOS.

'There is no such state as "Argentina". It's all a lie by the powergamers!'
— Muhammed Saeed al-Sahaf

Shortly after the OMGWTFBBQ events, T-Fox was forced to declare a temporary pause in the game due to Internet troubles. During that pause, a powergaming fest ensued as a result of Domination claiming to have killed the Emperor of Byzantium while he was on a 6-month world cruise. This caused the entire thread to begin doing the same to him, denying Argentina's existence and then saying he had died of plague. It culminated in choxorn (who wasn't even playing the game) claiming to have staged a coup and become the Socialist Leader of Argentina, which was met with much approval from all. Domination was unavailable for comment on this alarming turn of events, as he was banned at the time.

With his principal warmonger MIA and the game teetering on the verge of a general peace, Tanicius cribbed Thorvald's lead and introduced nuclear weapons "province-busters". The 8-member European alliance dogpiled the lone nation under the control of link16, who promptly quit (possibly out of rage, but most likely out of the knowledge it was futile), but unlike Dommy or Math, stayed out of the game for good. Aysee also ragequit and turned his nation into an NPC, so all of Domination's former allies had now rage-quit or stopped supporting him. Amid this, Tanicius began his defining GM tradition: as benevolent dictator, he vowed to correct the imbalances in the game with counter-imbalances, introducing superpowers and flexing NPC power blocs.

"What the flaming hell?? I go away for four days and come back to find three updates, Lanfar has disappeared, South Africa is threatening world war and the NPCs are a world power by themselves?? Good God alive!"
— Arakhor

Composed of massive NPC-human alliances, the tripolar world and the many "nuke" devices that TF introduced helped pump energy back into the thread, with some complimenting this change as having saved the game, despite complaints that the NPCs were disproportionately strong relative to player countries. It all went to Hell soon enough, as Mad Man, true to his name, declared war on the Koreans (or Manchus as Tanicius they call themselves now), and in the superweapon exchange, 4% of the world's population was killed. As war and battle after battle mounted as a result of this, Tanicius was headdesking; MAD is based on the principle nukes are never used... le sigh. Meanwhile, Omega124's war against NPC Texas, which had lasted most of the game and totaled over 90 million casualties, ended ingloriously when she quit for good, accusing Tanicius of rigging the results as revenge for their rivalry in IOT IV.

The game soon triggered a power-measuring contest, as Tanicius' GMPC created a device that could better interface cybernetics and one's brain. In response, Mathalamus relapsed into powergaming, creating an army of zombies that couldn't be destroyed even if you destroyed their nervous system, defying all logic. Math soon recovered from his bout of powergaming, destroying the zombies. While all this was going on, yet ANOTHER nuclear war that claimed over one billion lives ended (even Mecca was nuked, a nod to IOT I's predecessor). It became even worse when, in a true Civ 3 wonder cascade, Tanicius decided to erect a monument in a new capital, prompting Mathalamus and west india man—known for being as "strong as possible within the rules"—to create their own monuments: Math explicitly wanted to rival Tanicius's superiority complex, while WIM announced a rain forest over 2000 feet tall and as large as a major city.

"Stop it Domination. Now you're just trolling the game. It's not funny."
— Arakhor

After a long time away, Domination announced his return as Texas, triggering a new American War. The world breathed a sigh of relief, however, as he was banned just hours after declaring war, making the conflict null and void. ...Scratch that. He soon returned, but brought new posters who promptly took over the most powerful NPCs and started a world war. Hundreds of millions were killed. Dommy's tyrannical reputation was firmly entrenched.

Eventually, after much non-updating, random nuclear wars, and general chaos, everyone got tired of the game and decided it should end. Stealing Working from Thorvald's precedent, Tanicius crafted an epilogue a month later detailing the political fates of the major players.

Imperium Offtopicum V

"All I'm saying is what we have now, we might as well just call it an NES. "
— Zack

Meanwhile, following over a month of deliberation in the development thread, the rules for the community IOT were finalized, and IOT V aired August 1. Many changes were made to the game rules based upon the experience of the past four IOT threads and the Europe's Burning spin-off, including a new combat system, an economy and research system and a casus belli system. The thread was co-GMed by a Council of Five, led by Joecoolyo, each with different roles and responsibilities. A couple of turns in, and spam, friction between players, and confusion and criticism over the new rules caused Joecoolyo to freeze the thread for review.

The game went back onto the drawing board for another month, as the GMs debated changes to the rules. Finally, a "beta" version of the game with revised rules premiered on September 6, including innovations such as a tech tree, industrialization, national focus, a completely reworked combat system, and a separate thread for claims and income orders so they can be more easily managed (later used in Imperium Offtopicum VI and Revolution IOT). It restarted on a high note, but finally died after the sixth update due to crippling inactivity and loss of interest.

Imperium Offtopicum VI

"You guys are negotiating with a giant military state that just said its goal is the destruction of all countries. I'm not sure to laugh or cry."
— Omega124

Following the conclusion of the Classically-themed Ab Antiquo, taillesskangaru unveiled a highly anticipated "back to basics" iteration featuring a revised RNG combat system, espionage missions and nuclear development. A slow update schedule was countered by rapid-fire diplomacy such that within less than a decade, the world has seen the rise and fall of a pan-fascist alliance, a hilarious Asian political witch-hunt, two veritable world wars, and more recently an outbreak of zombie Hitlers. While successful in rekindling the old school atmosphere, the return of certain problem posters has led to bouts of excessive spam and inevitable GM frustration.

Taillesskangaru suddenly quit as GM on January 15, 2011, for reasons unknown (if you think he will say it here, sorry). He was succeeded by ZeletDude. A fortnight later, Toteone took over as the game's third GM. It's now de facto dead.

The Future

After this, there was no immediate release of an "Imperium Offtopicum VII," but instead a large number of IOT games appearing at about the same time, spin-offs of the original. It ceased to become a series of games, and evolved into a type of game, much like NES and Lazy-NES, although the main "numbered" series did eventually continue, and currently stands at ~24 games. In the next few months, IOT became one of the most numerous game types played in Forum Games, perhaps second only to Roll to Dodge.

Meanwhile, change was afoot. For more than a year, many forum gamers had been itching for a reorganization of the Other Games section that housed them, wanting varying things, but the most common things wanted were for the Forum to become a direct Subforum, rather than a subsubforum, and/or for the more serious games, particularly Mafia and Night of the Werewolves, to be given their own forum. It hadn't gotten anywhere, with several threads in Site Feedback talking about the issue, and the CFC Staff giving it much discussion themselves over this time. Finally, on June 19, 2011, Mafia and NOTW were lifted out of the spamfest of Forum Games and given their own forum. While they were there, the staff figured IOT deserved the same treatment, and it was given its own subforum as well.

Spin-offs

Imperium Offtopicum has inspired several spin-offs. This is due less to the success of IOT threads than the simple appeal of the IOT concept, and in some cases dissent among IOT players.

Amendment: since this last paragraph was written, "several" is no longer a good description of the number of spin-offs that Imperium Offtopium spawned. The list below is only a partial list and, unless you are prepared to resurrect the IOT Wiki spend extra hours looking through the Imperium Offtopicum forum, read the thousands of pages of "discussion" and "role-playing" and then summarize them here, it shall remain so.

Europe's Burning

"I don't have Napoleon Total War, so I can't simulate fights. If anyone did have Napoleon Total War s/he could help out by simulating any fights going on, but as of now all we can really do is type angrily. :("
— Mango Elephant

"Europe's Burning: Ye Olde Imperium Offtopicum" takes place in Napoleonic Era Europe, GMed by Island Game GM and another DYOS veteran e350tb. Launched on July 15, it is essentially the same as IOT, flavored for the 1800s, with the addition of a new combat system where armies are represented as physical entities on the map.

This one managed not to get crushed under powergaming quickly, mainly for the reason that Domination3000 was banned shortly after he joined at the beginning, was never able to claim anything, and eventually ragequit and gave all his land to Omega. Mathalamus didn't even show up for a while, and was unable to claim the Byzantine Empire (Domination beat him to the that, and everyone claimed Turkey to piss Dommy off while he couldn't do anything), and thus only recently took over a nation in Eastern Europe after its original player left. He never even actually did anything with this new nation, and eventually joined the "Quit and give my land to choxorn" bandwagon (see below).

The minor source of strife, ironically, seems to have been around Omega124 not being around—after creating a nation in France, she disappeared for a while after. So, 3 nations on the British Isles appeared and started claiming everything in France and Belgium, starting a massive war in France when Omega returned, unhappy about all of her surroundings being claimed. Some other nearby continental powers also got involved, on both sides.

However, what truly brought down the game was lack of GMs. e350tb GM'ed it initially, then left after 2 updates. Mango Elephant took over for a week or so, but couldn't simulate the battles and was hesitant to change the rules, leaving all wars in limbo until Update 6. Then he, too, was unable to GM, and left it to fdgsgds and Reiser.

A bit after that, due to a combination of RL, IOT V starting, mediocre GMing, and people just plain getting tired of the game, people started leaving the game, and giving all their land to existing nations. This eventually led to people just leaving for the hell of it, most of them giving their territory to choxorn because hey, why not? At the end, choxorn got around 300 territories in total, and as it had obviously become just plain silly at this point, the game was pretty much declared to be over. Methos eventually struck the thread closing it permanently.

History Rewritten

Essentially an attempt at an IOT-inspired Rise from Medieval Kingdoms, set in AD600. Proposed by Domination3000's pal Ilduce349 because, quote, he "dislike[s] the way the new IOT is being run". Most of the ideas for the rules including the map were stolen borrowed from the IOT Developmental Thread. A beta thread was launched on August 23. Like many spin-offs, it died very early to lack of interest.

Star Wars

"Star Wars: Galactic Empires" was an IOT-inspired game taking place in the Star Wars universe, GMed by Lighthearter and launched on July 5. It is de facto dead.

Mini-IOT I: The Cradle of Civilization

Run by civplayah since September 10, this is basically a smaller, shorter, more relaxed version of IOT based in Ancient Mesopotamia. It proved to be one of the more successful spin-offs. Eventually, the GM lost interest and retired, and a winner was decided by a vote.

Ab Antiquo

An experimental "IOT-inspired" forum game run by taillesskangaru, set in the ancient and classical eras. It premiered in early October and caused a small controversy when the GM banned Mathalamus and Domination3000 from the game. It was infamous for constantly-altered rules and inconsistent updates, but lingered on for about ten updates before the GM ended it, citing "flaws" and "real life issues".

Revolution IOT

"This entire war has been caused by Dommy not reading a book the right way."
— Double A

Based on a modification of Imperium Offtopicum VI rules, GMed by Sonereal, premiering on January 10, 2011. A direct sequel was planned, but ultimately abandoned, although it would become one of several series Sone cultivated. Notable occurrences were the early war between Egypt/Maryland and the fundamental Israelis, which was ended by Spanish and Yugoslavian intervention in favor of Israel; the invasion of Egypt by the USSR and Khitans in response to Egypt and Maryland's unjustified attack on Spain; and Sone pulling a Taniciusfox with an NPC end boss unleashing global thermonuclear Armageddon.

Enlightenment

An IOT-like game set in the 1720s with a heavy focus on naval combat, managed by Lighthearter.

Iron and Blood

"The peace talks have failed. I'm sorry for your nation's losses."
— Joecoolyo

The spiritual successor to IOT V, Iron and Blood is an IOT game starting in the 1800's and now in the 1900's. In it, players start in a province, expand into other provinces, build factories to boost the economy of the nation, and of course, fight tons of wars. It started out being GM'ed by taillesskangaru, but he later found himself unable to continue GM'ing and gave the game to kiwitt. As is usual for IOT threads, it rapidly saw the creation of a couple of polarized alliances—one in the Americas and Oceania, one in East Asia, and one in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Russia. Imperialist accusations have, of course, been abound, although they have fallen by approximately 8790919.23% since the destruction of Domination3000's country. Even so, they remain, with nations sending pictures of diplomacy group discussions to neutral nations to leak, shady diplomatic moves, counter-moves, and counter-counter-moves, abuse of the declaration of war rules, certain players claiming random territories all over the map and refusing to negotiate, nations leaving and people rushing to claim their land, and, of course, accusations of Imperialism. Luckily, so far, only one World War has been declared, and it was fought entirely in Canada in a couple of turns, because it turned out both sides wanted the same thing out of the war anyway. Even so, tensions remain high, and will likely remain so.

"... Who got involved in a colonial war on land that belongs to the UNA? The Accord. Who invaded land on another continent that belongs to Colombia and Peru? The Accord. Who attacked a new government that promises to free the people from oppression by a iron-fisted ruler? The Accord. Who wants to control all of Africa by a single nation? The Accord. Who turned on its ally Britain? The Accord. The Accord has accused almost everyone else of being imperialists when it turns out that they, especially France and Swaziland, are the worst imperialists of us all!"
— SouthernKing

Scratch that, the second world war has just started, between most of the world and the Grande Entente of three nations who, according to their opposition, got way too big and letting them go on would lead to a quick loss. It started out like any old world war, but then came the bad part when everyone realized how unbelievably overpowered the espionage rules were in some instances, allowing a couple of nations to cause huge areas to revolt against them without ever firing a shot and instantly destabilizing a formerly stable nation down to "Collapsing Apart." Because of that, the Entente gained a big advantage, despite the fact that the total combined strength of everyone fighting against them was much higher than their total combined strength. Eventually, everyone got annoyed at either the espionage rules, other problems with the game, or everyone else raqequitting due to those problems, and ragequit.

Historical epochs

Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium, atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

— Tacitus

Following a nascent period of growth similar to DYOS's Classical Age, Imperium Offtopicum achieved a critical mass for a self-sustaining community identity. Several cultural and demographic shifts occurred over the years that can be roughly categorized as follows:

Tanipolarity

Old IOTs: Have large war, GM ragequits. Middle IOTs: Have large war, everyone ragequits. New IOTs: Have large war, everyone nukes the hell out of each other.

— Double A

christos200 cranked his reputation for regime-hopping up to 11 in Multipolarity when he fled China with the country's entire treasury and nuclear stockpile, sacrificing a single-province false restart to obliterate his archenemy Hawaii before rejoining as a terror cell, knocking out a key superpower and drastically upsetting the balance of power for the rest of the game. This combined with discrepancies in stats reporting in the lead-up to christos' insurgency against China proper, and Taniciusfox's alleged loss of the details, led several players to believe Tanicius deliberately empowered christos as an antagonist.

The fledgling IOT community suffered benefited from a mass immigration of players from the Civ4 Stories and Tales subforum in 2011. Veterans of political backstab simulators such as Civilization Kings and Realpolitik AARs, these players replaced the backward pagan superstitions of "friendliness" and "diplomacy" with civilized innovations, such as ruthless metagaming and a play-to-win attitude that quickly scared off most of the original Forum Gamers who had better things to do than stress out over professional powergamers couldn't keep up with PROGRESS™. Named after Taniciusfox's defining series Multipolarity, which was characterized by incredibly rich roleplay, rampant nuclear trollquits, horrifically unbalanced espionage, and more spur-of-the-moment backstabbing than the Australian political scene between 2010 and 2018, this period saw the rise of the notorious warmonger christos200 and über-munchkin Patriotic_Fool as standard gameplay shifted towards wargaming.

This era also saw the birth of IOT Chat, then hosted at several Chatango servers, which became infamous for screencap-induced drama regularly throwing in-game decorum off a cliff. While not explicitly required to play a game, increasing use of chat for P2P diplomacy and/or certain GMs deliberately leaking update info gave players with a steady chat presence an ever-larger leg up over those that relied purely on the forums. Once players realized it wasn't smart to flaunt their "top-secret" strategies on a publicly-accessible platform, it was all but abandoned for shop talk, morphing into an off-topic commons that fostered the emergence of discrete sub-groups within the player base, often with little direct relevance to IOT itself. (Remember this for later.)

Furtive attempts were made to expand IOT beyond CivFanatics, none to lasting success. When a flame-ridden tirade by christos200 led to IOT IX being temporarily locked, Taniciusfox seized the opportunity to tighten his grip on the IOT brand provide a refuge from intrusive moderation by founding an entire forum of his own with blackjack and hookers; while the ProBoards architecture was generally inferior to vBulletin, the so-called Imperium Offtopicum Forums became legendary when Thorvald of Lym went absolutely insane and created sockpuppet accounts for the entire cast of Downfall, originally for his player country at the time but that went on to act like bona fide users, up to and including trying to join Multipolarity II as their own individual nations. Not knowing when to leave well enough alone, Tanicius' attempt to monetize user activity through incessant popups and aggressive adlinks scared everyone off, and the board was abandoned save for brief use to host roleplay interviews during IOT XIV.

Sonerealism

... Your continuing desire to justify your economics degree by making the perfect economics simulator for a game focused on geopolitics just create games which collapse on themselves before they even begin. It isn't just players who don't want their stats to be more complex than tax returns; you can't even handle the beasts you make. Look at Cold War, the only game you had in recent memory that actually had more than one update. Look how simplistic it is compared to IU, or your Blood and Iron game, or sofia. I don't think its a coincidence.

—Omega124

Competition between stats-minded GMs for ever-more-esoteric economic mechanics, combined with older roleplayers' lack of time/patience to run their own games, resulted in the concentration of active games around a GM oligarchy, chiefly Sonereal and Taniciusfox. These games attempted to replicate Paradox Interactive map-painters by hand, and were as hard to actually play as they were to run, with dozens of threads crashing out early due to player and/or GM burnout. Rather than admit there was more to running a game than coding a fully-automated Excel spreadsheet, Sone doubled down on ever-plainer disdain for the roleplayers and mocking anyone who thought you didn't need a graduate economics degree to be worthy of playing a forum game. This was roundly debunked by the smash success of Rosalind Can't's Imperium Offtopicum XIV and NinjaCow64's IdIOT, which lasted nine and sixteen months, respectively, and were some of the longest games turn-wise. The very definition of IOT as country RP began to break down with the proliferation of choose-your-own-adventure threads and other unconventional game modes in the era's latter months.

Longstanding issues with chat management continued to simmer beneath the surface, as Mosher's absenteeism led to cronyist mods abusing their authority with no means of recourse; in one instance, Sonereal bullied and temp-banned KaiserElectric over an in-game dispute. The situation reached a tipping point in early 2016 when Mosher endorsed Sone's tantrum after a failed bid to purge CYOA threads from the forum, leading the user base to jump ship to a final Chatango hub managed by NinjaCow. On the flip side, this epoch witnessed the zenith of community culture: the IOT podcast was revived with a proper structure; Reus spearheaded a Civ4 mod; and contributions to the wiki by people other than Thorvald reached their peak.

Pax Discordia

... I don't feel welcome here anymore. I've watched--from the outside--as this "community" has steadily grown more fragmented, sectarian, and frankly toxic. I've watched--from the outside--as the IOT Discord in particular has turned into an incubator for extreme cynicism and politics that I, to be blunt, consider utterly abhorrent. I've accepted that this is what IOT wants, and I've tried to ignore all of it and carry on. Unfortunately, it's escalated and bled out to a point where I can't.

— SouthernKing, 7 December 2018

The accusations leveled against me in what I can only describe as a dogpile, by people who until recently I believed if not friends than at least cordial acquaintances, have left me deeply shaken. I take responsibility for my failures, but the fact that there was not even the consideration of an honest mistake by people who have known me, in some cases nearly a decade, is forcing me to re-evaluate my presence in this community. If I am worth so little of your trust, I see little reason to burden you with my presence further.

— Thorvald of Lym, 7 May 2021

The promise...

With the Sonerealist paradigm discredited and a move to Discord later in the year easing many of the structural issues with Chatango, 2016 seemed poised for an IOT renaissance. While formal talks of an IOT‒NES merger had failed to bear fruit, the IOTers ultimately had the last laugh: in 2014, NES schismed over opposition to CFC moderation in an uncanny echo of IOT's own failed 2012 strike; unlike IOT, hardline NESers chose to flee to an external forum on "The Frontier", where they could finally repel the unwashed masses' attempts to penetrate the ivory tower right at account creation. The Frontier venture imploded within only a few years, leaving NES to dessicate on CivFanatics as the hardliners never returned. Recognizing the winds had changed, after a brief period of so-called "NESIOTs" the remaining users moved shop to the IOT forum, fortifying the player base with seasoned veterans and novel rulesets.

Unfortunately, 2016 was Election Year in the United States, and the rise of Donald Trump had a catastrophic effect on the chat community. Unlike Chatango, Discord enabled separate channels within a single server, meaning loudmouths could no longer barge in and derail the entire conversation. On the other hand, it was now easier to splinter attention into isolated interest groups, catalyzing the fledgling cliques seeded in the Chatango years. The chat community grew increasingly independent from the actual IOT board, with several chat regulars no longer even playing the games—chat was now to IOT what the Off-Topic forum is to CivFanatics in general. This was especially evident in how real-life politics, nominally confined to the #politics channel, set the server's tone as several prominent users became increasingly militant in reaction to the deteriorating discourse in the USA. After christos was banned in late 2016 for aggressive behaviour, the mods realized they no longer needed to feign neutrality for the sake of the Village Ancap, relaxing what used to be Red Diamond-level decorum in #politics and sitting by as polemical content bled out into the other channels.

...the reality.

By 2018, things were reaching a crisis point. In the first of several high-profile departures, SouthernKing announced he was quitting IOT due to feeling personally endangered by militant rhetoric. Rather than confront the issue, the mods opted to bleed out the Liberal filth through attrition; west india man, originally banned in the Chatango years for advocating violence against Brazilian politicians, was pardoned in 2019. Chat further fractured as a private server by Crezth eclipsed IOT as the nomenklatura's primary forum, acting as an incubator for the militant leftism now dominating the community. Masking the decline of the IOT forum proper was a brief influx of new players brought in by Omega late in 2020 (mere months before her own resignation), and slow-but-steady turnout by the ex-NESers, who largely abstained from chat's "off-topic" channels and by decade's close constituted the majority of the active players. Even this couldn't prevent it succumbing to the same fate as NES: as of June 2022, a sole game thread is active, begun in April that year.

What the fans are saying

^%#&*$ this. i quit. im obviously dealing with total idiots who cannot grasp that im simply more powerful than the rest of you EXCEPT the superpowers i listed above!

— Mathalamus ragequitting Imperium Offtopicum

thats it. im quitting. its apparent no one respects what i ahve to say at all even if i make valid points. shows how nice you all are.

— Mathalamus ragequitting Imperium Offtopicum, the second time

I also was in TAPPS once, but I quit when the Colombian NPC was made, and it was initially quite fun. Domination, stop being so extreme and let us all have fun - You've already stolen the position of 'Most Hated Person on Forum Games' from Mathalamus.

— west india man

I've had it with your insults, challenges and generally abrasive attitude. I am going to KILL you, Domination! Mark my words! Mark. My. Words. You can't make it all better just by saying "JK lol". I declare war between the Commonwealth and ALL the parties in the UUTSFR Civil War, except the Galactic Empire IF Zack rejoins. I declare a blood vendetta between you and I, Dommy. If you EVER post in ANY of my threads or PM me EVER again then I call the mods. I'm done putting up with you calling me Fascist and worse. You have insulted my honor and I cannot accept that.

— Lighthearter

Our imperialism, Domination? Your hilarity slays me, it really does. Also, I'd like to see you even try to eliminate all of Europe. Your arrogance astounds me.

— Arakhor

I can't even tell what the map looks like any more, too many screwy things have happened (I'm looking at you, Domination) since TF's last update two days ago.

— choxorn

YES. STOP PM'ING ME.

— e350tb, answering Domination's question if he had gotten his fifth PM about claims

I don't want to sound drastic, but it's starting to sound like people are getting turned off to the game thanks to the whims of a megalomaniac, and I'd rather not have that happen.

— schlaufuchs

Are you serious? Are you seriously serious? Are you threatening the Game Moderator? You do realize that I dictate the world map, I preside over the UN, and I run the combat? You would actually attack my player nation because as the impartial GM I don't bend to you?

— Thorvald of Lym

You felt like messing around in our game without even asking us first. You then even accused Tanicius of cheating when he forbade any new sign-ups. Get off your high horse already.

— Arakhor

Muahahaha you thought HITLER was bad!

— Domination3000

...and you wonder why you get accused of powergaming.

— e350tb, after Mathalamus calls himself God

Comic by Reus satirizing diplomacy between Indonesia and the Platonic Republic in IOT XIV. Ailedhoo was iconic for verbose, if rambling roleplay, and issuing long-winded denouncements at the slightest provocation. Did we mention JUSTICE!!?

WHY DON'T YOU ALL JUST KICK ME IN THE BALLS A FEW MORE TIMES JUST TO MAKE SURE?

— Double A

I'm done talking with you, arya. Done with your hatemongering. I'm remembering why I stopped playing these games...

— Zack

What is with people not paying attention to very basic aspects of this game, like who the GM is and when updates will happen?

— BSmith1068

I liked role-playing and enjoyment with reading narratives etc. What I got was hatred and ribbing for trying to make to take it seriously and be orderly. Good Luck with your childish antics, like ganging up on me for no other reason than supporting the GM in his efforts to reduce the spam in the main thread.

— kiwitt

I think announcing publicly that you're spying on someone is a sign that you are failing Espionage 101.

— choxorn

How can you declare history to be non-canon?

— choxorn

Tani, if you knew that would happen why did you insta-spawn the magic units there? You could at least let me enjoy a random event once in what's likely to be my only time having them...

— Tyo, gaining and then losing wizards before the update is even finished

I dont really care even if the whole population of the world will be exterminated. I will have my revenge.

— christos200

you are a f@#$@#@ @%^. you cant have anything but have your way, screw you im opening another game.

— ceaser1345, refusing to accept that ragequitting your country defaults it to GM fiat

So, Serbia-Greece bring the World to World War II and now its getting out with a white peace before the fighting even begins. Amazing.

— JohannaK

And thus IOT X became a warfest against the ways of the infamous Patriotic_Fool 1st The Munchkin, successor to the tradition of Mathalamus and Domination3000 after taking the throne from christos200 1st The Greek.

— JohannaK

Jesus Christ people, I go to sleep for a few hours and come back to find the forum filled with drama of the worst type - internet drama.

— filli_noctus

You all brought this on yourselves for not assuming that Christos is always going to go Nazi, Fascist, or expansionist in an IOT.

— Sonereal

This is not power gaming.

—eduhum, claiming a post-apocalyptic Polynesia can support a 108,750-ship blue-water fleet

I'm actually not terribly interested what a player's intent was for anything.

— Taniciusfox

I'm going to make an add on a forum website, see if we can't get a few more faces on board. But first is this SFW only or not?

— Applicant to Taniciusfox's FurAffinity spinoff

Threads

• Altered Maps VI: Xorda Gene Bombs.. et cetera (the madness started on page 17)
• OT Poster Empires
• Imperium Offtopicum
• Imperial Offtopicum 3: the quest for Imperium Offtopicum 2
• Imperium Offtopicum IV: Third's the Charm?
• Imperium Offtopicum II: Chronological Order Is For Chumps!
• Imperium Offtopicum V
• Imperium Offtopicum V - Second Thread
• Imperium Offtopicum VI: Rise of the Lost

Auxiliary Threads

• The UN Building (covers IOTs 1, 3 and 4)
• Wars/Battles Thread (covers IOTs 1, 3 and 4)
• IOT Development Thread

Pseudo-intellectual drivel

• Thorvald of Lym, "The Death of IOT". DeviantArt 30 October 2012; CivFanatics 10 November 2012.
• Thorvald of Lym, "The Cult of the Offensive". DeviantArt 1 November 2013; CivFanatics 4 November 2013.
• Omega124, "A Living World". CivFanatics, 4 June 2016.