idea NPC in Manamana

[Orioni]

Situation

The Manamana area between Alharu and Aurelia is of strategic importance.

Problem

The area surrounding the Manamana Canal has been occupied by so many previous players, it again and again cause lore continuity problems. Everyone wants to own the area, nobody wants to build a country there.

Idea

We set up a NPC in the area. That way, we have a name that actually sticks around. It doesn't need to be a massive country. Just an underpopulated country (because tropics) with a couple of cities at the end of each river, and perhaps on the shores of that big lake.

Here's a simple map I drew. The numbers mean the following.

1. Line 1. The southwestern border should probably extend along those elevated ridges. The NPC would only control its two rivers, but nothing more. This limits the impact on any future player-created countries.
2. Line 2. The northeastern border needs to extend at least this far to be realistic.
3. Line 3. Envelops the next elevated ridgeline. If you want to prevent any future players from proposing their own canal and muck up this NPC, this extension would prevent something like that from happening.

How about some lore? Well, one of my sandboxes contains a similar country I proposed to @Tagmatium Rules, but never used. With some minimal edits, we can repurpose it for the Manamana area. https://iiwiki.us/wiki/User:Orioni/Sandbox_3

Some additional ideas:

• Give it some of the lore that was created former by @Mauridiviah. In particular, the Mundus Liber Institute.
• Give it a city called "San Cristobal" for Bron Urgundy to broadcast from.

[Advocatius]

I cannot find this on the discord but I believe I do remember talk about the Manamana being a joint-AL project I think for post-anglia, although that depends on if it's so vital to the lore it has to be built before that.

[Orioni]

Any constructive comments or reasonable objections?

[Tagmatium Rules]

1 hour ago, Orioni said:

Any constructive comments or reasonable objections?

Sorry, I was hoping that another member of the AL might have been able to chip in and either confirm, deny or expand upon what Advo said above.

Would we be able to wait until we had more information?

[Orioni]

There's no rush. We have no deadline for this, unless perhaps the hypothetical appearance of a future candidate who wants to reside in the Manamana area.

Just like Advocatius, I searched for any previously existing discussions about this area, before making this topic. I presume somewhere in DM's or Discord there's a private discussion about this. Preferably, we can have such discussions out in the open.

[Tagmatium Rules]

I think I remember something talked about, as Advo said. I don't remember much more than that, though, other than it being a post-war thing.

[Kolhar]

I am very much in the same place as @Tagmatium Rules and @Advocatius. I recall there being some discussions about it, but I don't remember much more than that.

[Orioni]

Well, to summarise the collected feedback:

• There might have existed an earlier plan;
• a plan which nobody remembers;
• a plan which nobody can find; and
• a plan which nobody wrote down.

Which, in essence, makes this proposal the only one that actually exists.

So let’s take if from here, shall we?

[Xio]

I know internally the Aurelian League members have been discussing this for quite some time, though it hasn't led to anything public as there are quite a few opposing opinions being thrown around, and we'd prefer that everyone was onboard with at least some form of compromise before we said anything publicly. A couple ideas that were thrown around are:

• removing the Manamana entirely, to be re-RPed post-Anglia
• adding an Aurelian League Mandate to the area
• leaving as is for a future RP member (AL or not) to be placed there

 

[Tagmatium Rules]

19 hours ago, Orioni said:

Well, to summarise the collected feedback:

• There might have existed an earlier plan;
• a plan which nobody remembers;
• a plan which nobody can find; and
• a plan which nobody wrote down.

Which, in essence, makes this proposal the only one that actually exists.

So let’s take if from here, shall we?

Who needs the Mandela Effect when we have our own Manamama Effect?

[Orioni]

Thanks. Glad everyone really likes this proposal.

Now about those borders. Should the eastern border be line 2 or 3?

[Orioni]

Let's go for an eastern border at line #2, to keep this NPC footprint as small as possible.

[Orioni]

Moving this from OOC discussion to map request, since another three weeks have gone by. Again, just to repeat the goal, this is only to establish the NPC, not to claim control over it.

NPC application

• Country: Manamana
• Flag: see IIWiki page
• Capital: Manamana City
• Area: 290,417.15 sq km
• Perimeter: 2,728.75 km

Quick map:

• Southern border along the mountain ridges.
• Northern border encompassing the smallest area.
• Manamana City at the mouth of the river (Manamana River) with a lake (Lake Tranquilo).
• San Cristobal at the mouth of the other river (to be named by @Iverica).

/cc neighbouring @Advocatius, @Rhodellia and @Xio.

[Xio]

Ah, sorry for my lack of responses in this thread. I like everything you've put down.

I think for the pre-colonial population some kind of Uto-Aztecan makes the most sense, as my country needs a similar country nearby and the location works well.

"Mana" in Classical Nahuatl (CN) actually means "to offer" but also "to found" in the sense of "founding a settlement". Therefore Manacan would mean something like "where the town was founded". There is also another word in CN that fits "Manamana" which is "cemmana" which means "to disperse people, animals or things that were together". Cemmanacan would then mean something like "where the people were dispersed". Therefore, we could say this tract of land where these particular Nahua people are stretches from Cemmanacan (where they were originally displaced from) up to Manacan (the city they founded after being dispersed). As in, "From Manacan to Cemmanacan", which the Iverican speakers would shorten to "Manamanaca", then when Manamana gains independence it drops the "ca" suffix to just be "Manamana" (this could also be a big thing in Manamana, if it should re-adopt the 'ca' suffix to acknowledge its native roots and the native minority populations).

With the above info, I'd suggest replacing "Manamana City" with the name "Manaca City" (follow Spanish rules of converting Nahua place names to Spanish place names) or just "Manaca". It could be a kind of Mexico City or Athens with lots of ruins sectioned off, museums, etc. A smaller tourist industry compared to San Cristobal. "Cemanaca" (Cemmanacan) could be beside the Manamana Canal on that big lake.

The flag is cool but it's already used IRL so I think it'd be in poor taste to use it. However I like the design and I can produce a similar "off-brand" variant with the same symbolism of the seashell, stars for municipalities, blue and green, etc.

If @Louvier (now Pecario) is okay with it, we could extend Manamana's border up to the 3rd line so it borders his country. Gives him a fun neighbour to play with.

For the population, I think we should be a bit more generous. With its current land area of ~290,400 km^2, that gives it 2 points in land area. It's GDP per capita should probably be ~11,000 (akin to some Central American and South American nations) which is 1 point. That gives 1 point in population of, let's say 25 million.

Edited July 26, 2023 by Xio (see edit history)

[Pecario]

I'm okay with it.