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Declaring War

War is how territory changes hands. It's a deliberate, scheduled event tied to a fixed weekly session — not an instant free-for-all — and it only happens between two warlike nations (see Neutrality if you're not sure what that means for you).

1. Declare — any time

/nation war declare <nation>

Requires the Manage Diplomacy permission. You contest one territory — one connected cluster of the enemy's claims. If they have several separate territories, you'll be asked to pick which one to contest (by number).

You can't declare war if:

  • Either nation is neutral.
  • Your nation is already in an unresolved war (win, lose, or resolve it first).
  • The target nation is already in an unresolved war.
  • You have an active treaty or a recent alliance-break cooldown with them — see Diplomacy.

You can declare at any time — there's no need to wait for a specific day. Your war is automatically slotted into the next available weekly session.

2. The weekly war session

All battles happen at a fixed weekly slot: Friday, 18:00–00:00 (UK time). Only one war can be scheduled per session, and at most two upcoming sessions can be booked at once. When you declare:

  • If the next Friday's slot is free, your war is proposed for it.
  • If it's already taken, you're bumped to the Friday after.
  • If both upcoming Fridays are already booked, your declaration is rejected outright with a message to wait or contact an admin — it isn't queued indefinitely.

Any time this wiki (or Discord) mentions a battle time, it's shown as a dynamic timestamp that displays correctly in your own timezone.

3. Admin review

A declared war doesn't go live immediately — it's marked pending until an admin reviews it (via an in-game command or a Discord button). This is announced in the server's #nations-admin Discord channel. You'll see your war listed as pending admin approval until then.

  • If approved, your war is confirmed for its session slot, and it's publicly announced in the #nations-news Discord channel with a countdown timestamp. Online members of both nations also get an in-game chat message right away; anyone offline at that moment gets the same message the next time they log in (as long as the battle hasn't already happened by then).
  • If denied, the war is cancelled before it ever goes public, and your reserved slot frees up for someone else.

4. Changed your mind? Cancel it

/nation war cancel <nation>

Only the attacker can call off a war, any time before the battle starts, and it requires Manage Diplomacy. If the war had already been publicly announced, cancelling it posts a retraction to #nations-news too, so nobody shows up to a battle that isn't happening.

5. The warning window

Once approved, both nations get a warning (default 120 minutes before the battle) to rally members online. This is also when allies can answer the call to arms.

6. The battle

When the timer hits zero, everyone online on both sides is teleported to a battlefield around the contested territory:

  • Attackers spawn just outside the territory; defenders spawn at its centre.
  • You can't leave the battlefield — step out and you're pulled back.
  • Inside it, participants can build and break freely, and PvP is on between the two sides.
  • Elimination decides it. When a player dies (or logs out) they're out, and become a spectator locked to a living teammate's view. A side wins when the entire enemy roster is eliminated.
  • A nation whose land is at stake can concede with /nation war surrender <nation> (or /nation surrender <nation>).

7. The spoils (reparations)

If the attacker wins, they:

  • Capture the contested territory — those chunks become the attacker's claims.
  • Seize reparations (default 50%) — that percentage of the defender's nation bank, plus the same percentage of every online losing member's personal balance, transfers to the winner's bank.

If the defender wins, they keep their land and nothing is transferred.

Things that end a war early

  • Surrender — the opponent wins outright.
  • No-show — if a side has nobody online when the battle starts, the war is cancelled.
  • Admin action or a disband — the battle is torn down.
  • Server restart mid-battle — the battle is cancelled; battle state isn't saved across restarts.

Check your current war any time with /nation war list, or details with /nation war info <nation>.