The current NPA law is, put simply, largely nonfunctional. It does not make logical or temporal sense, does not reflect the basic realities of NationStates military gameplay, and is full of anachronistic liability slop that opens members to wacky legal action seemingly just due to the vibes of having such provisions. It not only fails to constrain actual abuses but outright encourages them through a poor and unnecessary oath and a capacious classification power that's not only entirely discretionary but virtually necessary for even routine operations due to how poorly constructed the rest of the law is. I think it's worth noting that the relatively recently implemented classification power is problematic primarily due to the fact that it's largely the thing holding the law together at all. The truly dangerous portions, from the liability vibes slop to the oath, are largely things that have been retained from very early versions of the law. If you'd like to see even more wacky vibes LARP stuff, check out
this if you have access to it.
The first major change under this new version would be the removal of the liability vibes slop passed down through generations of amendments, by which I mean the legal requirements to "endeavor to maintain an active and well trained military" and "act with respect towards the natives of the region." Imagine an NPA member getting sued for being insufficiently respectful toward fascists or the Court deliberating over whether a Minister was trying hard enough to do their job. Speaking of the Minister, why are they legally required to "carry out such legal missions as are authorized by the Delegate"? If a Minister isn't doing their job, the appropriate recourse is for the Delegate to talk to or fire them, not haul them to court. All of this vibes slop needs to go, and it's a small miracle that no one's exploited it yet.
The second big change is the removal of the oath. The current NPA oath reads as follows:
By my honor and by my conscience, I will endeavor to honestly and faithfully serve The North Pacific. In peace and in war, I will support and defend The North Pacific and its legal system of government. If I perceive or gain knowledge of activity to overthrow the legal government of the region, I will report it to the Security Council without delay. I promise to act properly and uprightly, to obey the lawful orders of the Delegate and my superiors, to comply with the law and all military rules, and to keep the military secrets trusted in me. Should I be given a position of military leadership, I will endeavor to set a good and encouraging example to my subordinates. When deployed, I will be mindful that my actions reflect on my region, and endeavor to represent The North Pacific with honor and dignity. I swear all this freely and without reservation.
I generally dislike oaths because I think they're anachronistic and lazy, and should just be incorporated into legal provisions. That aside, the NPA oath is genuinely dangerous because it gives discretionary rules cooked up by the del and minister legal force. I could order members to give me their legendary cards on penalty of forswearing. The oath also suffers from the aforementioned vibes slop issue, like members being liable for not "endeavor[ing] to represent The North Pacific with honor and dignity"or those in "military leadership" not "endeavor[ing] to set a good and encouraging example to [their] subordinates." I see no reason not to do away with the NPA oath entirely. It contributes nothing of value. If members of the NPA do a bad job, they should be held accountable through the executive and actual legal code provisions just like members of every other executive department.
The last and most critical major change is a restructuring and modernization of the relationship between the NPA and the RA. Under the current law, the del or exec officer charged with military affairs need to notify the RA of operations involving "restricted actions" such as setting a password. These restricted actions are a holdover from earlier versions of the law, where the Delegate could exempt class A discretionarily and the RA could exempt class B in advance.
The del and the RA cannot do this under the current law, and have not been able to do this for the last year. Instead, under the current 2025 law, the del/minister must notify the RA of operations involving restricted actions at least 12 hours in advance, and the RA must vote on permitting class B. This doesn't apply if the del/minister "classify" the operation in question, which is a discretionary status that can be removed by RA majority vote. The RA can also order the NPA to withdraw from a region and impose undefined "other requirements" to reverse performed restricted actions. There are a few ways for regions to be exempt from restricted actions in advance, specifically through a war declaration, on native request (though the law is hilariously worded such that the natives themselves are exempt), and all regions that were exempted from any restricted action, A or B, prior to the passage of the 2025
Free and Speedy Troops Act being grandfathered in as exempted from all restricted actions.
Sound convoluted? Well, there are a few problems here. For starters, neither the del nor the RA can actually exempt a region preemptively like they used to be able to. The RA may only provide permission in the context of a specific operation once notified of that operation, either at least 12 hours in advance or when declassified. The RA also needs to vote on all future operations targeting the same region, and by extension cannot
revoke the regional exemptions that do still exist. Combined with the grandfathering of historical exemptions by the Free and Speedy Troops Act, this means that the RA cannot lift restrictions on any region outside of the context of a specific operation, and that there exists a body of permanent legacy exemptions that are entirely unreviewable by the RA, ranging from all regions that "support [the] cause" of "The Communist Bloc, The Brotherhood of Malice, The Black Hawks, [and] Sparkalia" to all regions that "knowingly harbour individuals or Regional Officers who… have a history of promoting fascism." If we get serious reform in TCB to the point that we're no longer hostile and end the war, or if we get a significant course correction by TBH, it won't matter. They'll still be exempt from all restricted actions forever. If a region has a reformed player in it who posted some fascist slop 20 years ago, it too will be exempt from all restricted actions. Sidelining both the RA and the executive for unreviewable legacy exemptions while requiring repeat votes on the same region for every new operation is not a functional way of doing law.
Oh, another funny thing. 7.7.56 says that "Regions exempted by the Regional Assembly from the restrictions on the North Pacific Army will automatically have the diplomatic restrictions imposed on them." The Regional Assembly can't exempt regions anymore or review grandfathered exemptions. This is Not Good(™).
Another significant problem is the 12-hour notification requirement, especially when combined with the discretionary and capacious classification authority. The MGC planned
the recent Vibonia operation in the roughly 8 hours prior to update.
Because 8 is less than 12, the operation by definition needed to be classified. Ideally the law doesn't force us to classify operations just to avoid breaking the space-time continuum. Additionally, the law assumes that whether an NPA member or operational partner will undertake class B actions is something that can be definitively established at least 12 hours prior to the relevant operation. On-the-ground realities and operational parameters can and do change, and we might go into an operation not planning to put up a password or banject any natives before realizing that we actually have an opportunity to do so to a region we all hate but can no longer exempt in advance, or realizing that performing such actions would be beneficial to accomplish our goals. Once again, the law forces us to classify operations because the law does not reflect reality. And because the law no longer allows the RA to exempt regions in advance, we're forced to play this silly and damaging classification game.
So we have a law that heavily incentivizes or outright forces classification of routine operations and operations we wouldn't otherwise classify. But what happens if a del/minister starts actually abusing this authority? Well, the RA would have to find out about the operation, then debate and vote to declassify, then debate and vote on the class B restricted actions, then potentially debate and vote yet again on withdrawing the NPA. Even with minimum 3-day voting periods, a minimum 2-day debate period on the restricted actions, and no debate period for the others, that's a lot of time. And with how heavily the law leans on discretionary classification to keep itself from falling apart, recognizing actual abuses of classification authority becomes very difficult, especially when classification entails not notifying the RA. I also just dislike using "classification" here in an entirely different way than the word's commonly understood or how it's used elsewhere in the Legal Code.
To fix all this, I've opted to get rid of classification entirely. Instead of requiring illogical, convoluted, and temporally unsound votes, this bill would require notifying the RA of all deployments in which certain actions are authorized by NPA leadership or operational partners. I've also modernized the list of actions to include frontier annexation and F/S status transition. Additionally, this bill includes a "soft classification" in that NPA leadership can notify the Speaker instead of the full RA. This would provide a more transparent and robust system where the NPA isn't forced to classify routine operations and the RA doesn't have to worry about the NPA going behind its back.
I've also consolidated the 3 different sequential votes into a single "Assembly veto" on NPA deployments, which can potentially pass in as little as 3 days. Thus, the RA will know what the NPA's doing and can quickly put a stop to it if needed. This will provide for greater operational flexibility than the current 12-hour-unless-classified scheme or the advance exemption one before it, while making it far easier for the RA to know what the NPA is doing and hold it accountable. We can also finally get rid of the ridiculous legacy exemptions.
The NPA will also be required to maintain certain public materials, similar to how the Speaker is required to maintain a public roster of citizens. These materials include an NPA roster (which we already have) and an NPA executive directive (which we've historically used in one form or another, from the old Code of Governance to a Delegate Directive). The RA will need to be notified of changes to the Directive. This addition wouldn't give discretionary military rules legal weight because that would be insane, but it does add that much more transparency and structure to things.
You may have noticed the inclusion of an interpretation clause (7.6.50): "In matters pertaining to this section or military affairs, the Court will defer to reasonable interpretation by the Military Executive." Given that military gameplay is a specialized and mechanically niche part of NS, any law regulating it necessarily relying on some jargon without being able to define every single term, and that we've had court rulings in the past that butchered the law and hamstrung the NPA by justices or THOs without R/D experience or knowledge, I think it's important for the court to defer to expertise where reasonable. If the court doesn't believe an interpretation to be reasonable, it won't be bound to defer to it, but must at least articulate that it doesn't believe it to be reasonable and ideally why.
Lastly, I've made several deliberate writing choices that I think are worth explaining for the benefit of people reading this thread and for future authors. I've made the bill work regardless of the NPA's actual name to accommodate potential rebrands or one-off cultural events in the future and prevent someone from trying to skirt the law by using non-NPA forces. In addition to modernizing the list of actions, I've added a clause on notifying the RA of militia mobilization. I made sure that all authority and accountability would flow through a defined "Military Executive" to ensure that individual NPA members aren't being hauled off to court for things outside their control and who exactly is obligated to do things under the law is clear. The Military Executive terminology has its roots in the old
NPA Code of Governance. Speaking of accountability, this new version would require that NPA members actually be TNP residents. Lol. It goes without saying that I've adjusted related clauses in other portions of the law to work with this new version.
That's what I've got for you. Feedback would, of course, be appreciated and I'm happy to answer any questions. I think this bill has the potential to finally solve a part of the Legal Code that's caused a lot of friction for as long as I've been in TNP, in a way that's better for operational flexibility, for accountability, for futureproofing, and for overall sanity. I believe this bill also represents a cleaner law that will be easier for future TNPers to modify and introduces some useful concepts such as where legal obligations flow through and the idea of deference. The NPA and the RA are part of the same region and should operate collegially and frictionlessly.
