The Monarchy of Wintreath
Spring 2016 State of the Region Address
Good evening regionmates, Citizens, and friends across NationStates,
As we spring into summer here in Wintreath, we have many things to be proud of...record-breaking activity, our first Werewolf game to go over 1000 posts, the establishment of the Wintreath Academy, and a new treaty with our friends in International Northwestern Union, just to name a few. More importantly, we are everything I envisioned and hoped we would be when I founded this region...a strong community of wonderful people, a region of fun things to get involved in, and a place of openness and warmth where people can come together, get to know each other, and become friends. That's what makes our region so great and that's what makes this region continue to matter.
It goes without saying that I believe Wintreath is one of the best places to be a part of, and there in nowhere else that I'd rather be as a person and as a leader. It amazes that that even two and a half years after I founded this region, there always seems to be new things to do, new opportunities to discover, new directions to consider, and new reasons to put my all into this place. I know that I'm a very lucky person to continue to have the support of this amazing community, and it's something I appreciate every day. I also appreciate our friends from outside the region, from our treaty partners to the more than 30 regions we have relations with to the many tourists that come to enjoy our games and festivals.
We've made so much progress in the last six months...the question is, where do we go from here? I don't think we need to go far. We're already everything I hoped that we would be when I founded Wintreath. All we need to do is build on what we've already built to become a bustling, buzzing region, where people come to experience our warmth and hospitality, to take part in exciting and fun events, and to become part of something that's very special, which I think we already happen to be.
To chart that course, the first thing I would like to focus on is our activity as a region. In my last address, I called for the community to take the lead in building our activity, and you certainly heeded the call! We were putting in amazing numbers during months when many regions struggle, but recent events have exposed a problem: we grew tall, not wide. I hope that we continue to have so many extraordinarily active people, but we also need to continue to attract new friends to the community. That's why we've been in the midst of overhauling the entire experience in the region for new players, from modifying our recruitment to posting guides for new players to reforming our Citizenship process. We're continuing to streamline our forums so that the purpose of each is easier to understand, and hopefully soon we will be overhauling our mentoring system as well.
This is an area that the entire community can help with as well...as important as it is to attract new friends, it's just as important that they have people to engage with when they get here, and I encourage everyone to take part in keeping Wintreath a beautiful region to be active in...by welcoming new members and Citizens, by encouraging them to get involved and helping them if they need it, and by continuing to create things that people want to take part in: discussions, games, activities, opportunities, and things to do in general. The more people that help create and maintain new cultural aspects, the more variety of things we can do, and the more people that will come here and stay here.
On my end, I will also be building and developing our website to include things that I think will make Wintreath stand out from other regions. I have a lot of ideas in mind, and over the next few months I will be dedicating time to some of them...for example, the redeveloped user profiles that recently came out, and the upcoming nation and character profiles that we have discussed. I hope that the new profiles will let people better present who they are, and that character and nation profiles will boost our roleplaying chops and open the way to doing more with nations and characters. Overall, I would like us to together build things that set us apart as a region and that everyone has fun with, because we can't forget that ultimately what everyone wants in a game (even a political simulator) is to have fun!
Finally, while it's important that the community take a leading role in building the region and maintaining our community, it's important that an active Monarchy also take a role as well. Although nobody has complained about it, I have felt that as the community became more active, the Monarchy became laid-back...too laid-back. As leaders of this region, we are not doing all that we should be doing to lead the region and to support it, and for that I must apologize. We must never forget that no matter how successful the region becomes, our purpose remains the same: to serve the community, to support its endeavors, and lead the region toward things that will benefit it. If someone in our leadership is not doing that, then we have to allow someone else the opportunity to do so as part of a meritocratic society.
I have already put in place new Cabinet procedures, where at least once a month all Jarls must report to me their activities, accomplishments, and plans, along with any problems that they encountered that we need to focus on as a Cabinet. This will allow us to objectively look at what we're doing as a Cabinet, to see which ministries aren't performing up to par, and to spot problems so we can better come up with solutions to them as a team. I also want to look into better ways to recognize the people who have contributed to our region, and to take a good, hard look at our guilds, which I still believe can live up to the promise of being centers of opportunity and accomplishment for those that want to make their names known in those areas.
This is only a broad overview of what I will be focusing on in the next few months, but I hope that this overview gives you some idea of what I think the region can become and where I feel work is needed to get us there. I hope that everyone will think of what you like about Wintreath or about what you would like to see it go and work to make it happen, because there's room for us to do many things and the region will be best served if there are more people growing the region and the community in many directions. Whatever happens, I hope that I can report still greater successes for our region and our community in a few short months when we crossover from summer to autumn.
But for now, thank you. Thank you for continuing to support me as your Monarch, and for continuing to have faith in both me and my Cabinet. As I always have before, I will work hard every day to justify that faith.
May our region continue to grow and prosper,
Inric Nordrim Kestar (Wintermoot of Wintreath)Monarch and Founder of Wintreath