Senior Editor James Halpert sat down with all candidates for Minister of Engagement to know more about them, their journey in the South Pacific and their ideas for the Ministry of Engagement.

Tisha / Nyxonia

Thank you again for agreeing to this conversation.

Certainly, I am happy to share my ideas about TSP and the Ministry of Engagement

You already made a very detailed introduction of yourself in your campaign thread, but I still would like to hear a bit more about you. For instance, how did you come to get involved in the region?

Oh, I was hatched in TNP and spent most of my time just dealing with my nation of Nyxonia, doing issues and trying out just about every flavor of government to see how it influenced stats. I had little to do with TNP other than dipping in to their RMB. I found it to be a pretty dissatisfying place but I did run across a few people from other regions.
TSP seemed to me to be a bit more laid back and tolerant. I think for a day or two I jumped around to a bunch of regions. Some UCR some GCR but TSP had a culture where I felt welcome and I was very pleased by the pro LGBT stance and defender ideology.
I am very tolerant and accepting in my RL life and in gameplay I find things that affirm my personal beliefs and choices.
I never could quite get in to the RMB RP, I just grew in to gaming back when we still had hardcover D&D books and character sheets. So arbitrary RP makes no sense to me.

So your focused instead on the forum and server, I reckon.

Oh, most certainly. It was a good fit that I am already quite active in Discord. I run my own discord server that is populated with LGBT gamers, all in their late teens to mid twenties so there was a fit.
I also Patreon lots of independent authors and artists so they each have a discord server that I spend time in.
Most of the authors I sponsor end up on Scribblehub or RoyalRoad so my reading interests, their writing interests, discord and gaming all come together.

I find it really interesting that you deliberately came to the region rather than being spawned here. Did you initial impression of TSP change in any way after you joined? Or did you discover anything about the region that you hadn't particularly expected at first?

Well, initially there was a little bit of a curb to jump over to get familiar with people. But that is true of any online community. TSP is more established so you get more of the who are you? But I am persistent.
One thing that stood out was how TSP has a belief in laws and rules that have evolved.
It has a history, sometimes tumultuous. and that is OK too. it makes the place plucky.

Is that something that was different from other regions that you looked into?

Oh, definitely the pluckiness.
So many regions are graveyards or have four or five active participants who are like grandpas sitting on the porch, watching the bug light.

So you came and eventially joined the Assembly and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Yes, I enabled my WA status and sat on that for a few weeks, just learning. Then I joined the legislature.
Initially I chatted with a few cabinet members and it was suggested that I run for Ministry of Culture. But it was halfhearted on my part. I did not feel an attraction to it.
I offered to sit on a few ministries, to gain experience, and came on board with MoFA as an ambassador, then I picked up a second ambassadorship.
I also became a deputy chair of the assembly.
It was a tough time, only getting the appointment and Hya had gone on an absence so it was a struggle, not knowing where the keys to the truck were kept.
I took on more responsibilities and became Secretary of State (one of three) and that gave me a bit of passion for understanding how all of the other regions worked. I spent time in every region where we have an embassy to watch what worked and what didn't.

At the risk of sounding cliché, did you learn anything from that experience?

Oh yes, I definitely learned as deputy chair of the assembly. I had to go dig out my roberts rules of order book... In my RL life I once served as a school board member and I had to recall all of that stuff.

Now you are running for Minister of Engagement. How did you go from Deputy Chair and Secretary of State to the MoE?

LOL, good question; If anyone has watched discord or the RMB for the past six months I have always stepped in to be helpful with new people, I participate in discussions and debates and try to be the voice of reason and of contemplating the longer term ramifications of decisions we might make today. Engagement with new nations, my desire to document processes (an offshoot of my professional life as an engineer) and having clearly spelled out procedures have destined me to be the infrastructure -chick.
USoViet has created a great system and it is all primed to go, it just needs fuel in the tank (content).

That leads to an interesting question. Engagement can mean different things to different people. What's the role of the Ministry of Engagement within the region?

In my campaign I talk about how the house has been built, but now we need furniture, artwork on the walls and food in the fridge. I intend to stock the house up and get it running on a paying basis.
Engagement to me is the mechanisms and people who match up the new nations and players with TSP. And since we are a feeder that is a portal in to the rest of the game, because not everyone will stay in our region.

You mention outreach as an important part of engagement.

Yes, not only are we a nursery with eggs hatching and new players peeking out. We are where puppets get spawned, where refugees from other regions (like me) may end up. To put it in a sci-fi movie reference, TSP is like Babylon 5 A place of trade, of embassies and of danger.
As engagement goes, those initial few days, or weeks or months for a nation. That sets the tempo for how they play NationStates.

What specific things do you think MoE would need to do to improve its outreach? And to whom?

Well, firstly we need to do a better job of encouraging the influx of new players who open their eyes in our region to know that it is not all chaos. That this can be a haven, even temporarily. This means explaining the mechanisms of gameplay to them and maybe teaching them a few cool tricks that the more experienced players have figured out.
We all have been hit by that overload of telegrams on joining. So maybe we can do some soft-messaging a day later to say hey, its not that bad, let us show you how.

A follow-up of sorts to those who haven't left.

And then we get the adolescents who come in to RMB but go no further. We need to introduce them to gameplay on a regional level. Maybe teach them how to RP in a more organized fashion rather than just S&^t talking each other.
And we have an extensive arrangements of embassies, with GCR's. We can be a feeder to them in a controlled way.

What do you mean?

It can be a form of symbiosis, this I really need to talk to the cabinet about. But if someone is looking for a home and we have an idea of what they are looking for maybe we can steer them to a friendly port?
So it is an extension in to FA.

I see what you mean. That's certainly an interesting idea.

There is going to be a change to NationStates when "Frontiers" happens. We want to be in front of that rather than being left in the dust.
We will not automatically just get a big chunk of new nations. We will need to become competitive (and selective) too.

This leads to another question. If you are elected, how would you approach the issue of accountability? I mean, how would you ensure that the public knows what's on your agenda and whether you are following through with it?

Oh, this is pretty easy to answer. A campaign implies promises that might be kept. I would rather it be a plan to be followed, and adapted as things change. Surely I will be issuing monthly updates but there will also be a constant change-log kept of what is happening right then. I will be looking for help because I am not the end-all-know-all answer to everything. I want to draw on talents from experience, but also passions of new players and new ideas.
People will be able to step-in, even to just do a little task.. But they are going to get recognized for it.

I believe with this we should start wrapping up. I don't know if there is anything in particular that you'd like to highlight?

I think you hit the high points. I can go on for hours and hours. But people will put me in a bag and toss me in a river.
I ask that people not stand on formality. Come to me and ask, give me ideas.

Then thank you for your time! I encourage all legislators to check Tisha's campaign and ask questions so that you can cast an informed vote come the Voting Period.

Thanks so much.